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The Heredity of Australian Higher Education Matthew Charles Brett

Student ID 198823670 ORCID: 0000-0002-4169-0955

Doctor of Philosophy – Education Submitted 11/2020 Melbourne Graduate School of Education This thesis is submitted in total fulfilment of the Doctor of Philosophy – Education through the Melbourne Centre for the Study of Higher Education at the University of Melbourne.

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ABSTRACT

This dissertation defines the heredity of Australian higher education, and the mechanisms through which inherited characteristics are transmitted across time. The metaphor of heredity has been used by eminent scholars writing about the past, present and future of higher education, suggesting that universities evolve in ways analogous to the natural world. This dissertation extends the metaphor by detailing a conceptual model through which this evolution occurs.

Consistent with higher education and public policy literature, heredity is positioned as the product of an integrated higher education and public policy cycle, bridged by the “DNA” of higher education legislation, and situated within a broader social context. The creation, replication and amendment of legislation provides a lens through which the evolution of Australian higher education can be traced. The research applies this model of heredity to higher education financing legislation between 1850 and 2020. The research sought to identify patterns evident in financing legislation over this timeframe. The relevance of jurisdictions to heredity was examined. The extent to which environmental adaptive pressures catalysed changes in financing legislation was also explored.

The model and its application reveals a high level of legislative activity across three distinct sub-systems: the endowment embedded in university Acts passed by states before 1950; grants for higher education mediated by States Grants Acts passed by the Commonwealth from 1951 to 1988; and grants for higher education provided directly to institutions by the Commonwealth thereafter. Jurisdictions were found to respond to the social, economic and political forces consistent with their shared Westminster tradition, whilst responsive to their unique context. A repeated cycle was identified in which the range of activities financed proliferates and is then intermittently consolidated within the core financing mechanism. There is a trend across sub-systems for increasing complexity, primarily as a result of more stringent governance and accountability legislative content. Textual analysis of legislation highlights content that is highly conserved across time, and content that is reused across legislatures and legislation.

Several environmental factors were found to exert adaptive pressure on financing legislation, with varying influence across time. Support for new disciplines representing the expanding frontiers and segmentation of knowledge was evident pre-1951. As the higher education system matured, economic drivers – both real and assumed – took on a more explicit role, tempered by social and equity concerns. Contemporary higher education sees more substantive references to global student mobility.

The high rate of legislative activity was found to be the product of an inherent tension in Australian higher education. The trend to higher levels of participation and research means that adequacy of resourcing at a point in time is inevitably insufficient to accommodate growing demands. Australian legislatures have managed this tension with hyper-incremental change, and the rare embrace of major change that leads to new legislative sub-systems.

Insights arising from the heredity of Australian higher education allow for a plausible utopia to be described. Through reusing the genetic inheritance of Australian higher education, components of a new legislative sub-system are described appropriate for post-universal levels of participation.

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DECLARATIONS

This is to certify that

(1) the thesis comprises only my original work towards the award Doctor of Philosophy,

(2) due acknowledgement has been made in the text to all other material used, and

(3) the thesis is less than 100,000 words in length, exclusive of tables and bibliographies.

Signed ……………………..

Date 10 March 2021

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ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

This dissertation would not have been possible without the guidance and encouragement of my doctoral supervisor, Professor Richard James. I am grateful and humbled by the potential he saw, cultivated and nurtured within me. This was no trivial investment, but I hope that the returns will justify the time and wisdom he has been so generous in sharing. Richard has been unwavering in a belief that I was capable of more; a daunting proposition, but one that has catalysed enormous intellectual growth, for which I am personally proud.

My parents, Peter and Rebecca Brett, were filled with pride when my candidature commenced, and whilst my father passed away early in my candidature, I know he would be as proud as my mother now is to hear of my completion. As Deaf adults, whose education was limited, their experience of university is through their sons. They always encouraged us to try our best and were happy with whatever that achieved. I want to thank them for instilling a love of education and giving me the gift of bilingualism. Spanning Deaf and hearing worlds, and traditional and visual spatial languages, has given me a different perspective. This combined with Richard’s belief and guidance has contributed to a work that generates novel and distinctive insights.

There have been others who have played important roles in my intellectual journey. Professor Gabrielle Lakomski catalysed an earlier pivot to a more scholarly outlook. Professor Belinda Probert reinvigorated my focus when distractions of work and life were enemies of completion. Professor Glyn Davis provided insightful guidance that crystallised the central propositions into a more coherent form. I am grateful for editorial support from Claire McGregor, and critical comments from examiners that ensure the clarity of the final product.

Finally, to my family, Kim and Maia. I am thankful for your love, support and acceptance throughout my candidature, and I am a better person for having embarked on the journey and being part of your lives.

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TABLE OF CONTENTS ABSTRACT ............................................................................................................................................ 2

DECLARATIONS .................................................................................................................................... 3

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ........................................................................................................................ 4

TABLE OF CONTENTS ............................................................................................................................ 5

TABLE OF FIGURES ............................................................................................................................... 9

TABLE OF TABLES ............................................................................................................................... 10

ABBREVIATIONS AND ACRONYMS ..................................................................................................... 11

CHAPTER ONE: INTRODUCING HEREDITY AND HIGHER EDUCATION ................................................... 12

THE FUTURE OF AUSTRALIAN HIGHER EDUCATION ............................................................................... 12

ADVOCACY FOR A DIFFERENT FUTURE ................................................................................................... 14

HEREDITY AND HIGHER EDUCATION ...................................................................................................... 15

THE HEREDITY MECHANISM ................................................................................................................... 16

RESEARCH QUESTIONS ........................................................................................................................... 18

DISSERTATION STRUCTURE .................................................................................................................... 20

CHAPTER TWO: AUSTRALIAN HIGHER EDUCATION POLICY AND LEGISLATION ................................... 24

HIGHER EDUCATION POLICY AND LEGISLATION TODAY ......................................................................... 25

THE EVOLUTION OF AUSTRALIAN HIGHER EDUCATION LEGISLATION ................................................... 28

CONVENTIONAL EXPLANATORY ACCOUNTS AND NARRATIVES ............................................................. 32

HIGHER EDUCATION POLICY ADVICE – A GROWING CONCERN .............................................................. 33

FULL CIRCLE: GLYN DAVIS AND THE POLICY CYCLE ................................................................................. 34

CHAPTER THREE: THEORISING HIGHER EDUCATION AND PUBLIC POLICY ........................................... 41

HIGHER EDUCATION .............................................................................................................................. 41

Martin Trow: Elite, Mass and Universal Participation ....................................................................... 41

Burton Clark: The Triangle of Coordination ....................................................................................... 42

Clark Kerr and The Uses of the University .......................................................................................... 43

Trow, Clark and Kerr – A Sequoia Trinity ........................................................................................... 44

Global Developments ......................................................................................................................... 46

PUBLIC POLICY ....................................................................................................................................... 47

Defining Policy and Legislation .......................................................................................................... 47

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Policy Stability and Reform ................................................................................................................ 48

HEREDITY AS AN INTEGRATED HIGHER EDUCATION PUBLIC POLICY CYCLE ........................................... 52

CHAPTER FOUR: A MODEL OF HEREDITY FOR AUSTRALIAN HIGHER EDUCATION ................................ 60

THEORETICAL POSITIONING OF THIS RESEARCH .................................................................................... 60

RESEARCH DESIGN: APPLICATION OF A MODEL OF HEREDITY ............................................................... 62

RESEARCH METHODS AND DATA SOURCES ............................................................................................ 65

Foundational Financing Legislation ................................................................................................... 65

Jurisdictional Considerations ............................................................................................................. 67

Adaptive Pressures ............................................................................................................................ 68

Commonwealth Financing Legislation, 1951 to 1988 ........................................................................ 70

Unified National System – The Higher Education Funding and Higher Education Support Acts ....... 71

ORGANISATION OF RESEARCH FINDINGS ............................................................................................... 72

CHAPTER FIVE: HEREDITY AND JURISDICTIONS ................................................................................... 75

THE HIGHER EDUCATION PUBLIC POLICY CYCLE: GENESIS AND EARLY EVOLUTION ............................... 76

The University of Sydney, 1850 .......................................................................................................... 76

The University of Melbourne, 1853 ................................................................................................... 79

Building the Universities of Sydney and Melbourne, 1853 to 1856 ................................................... 82

Scholarships and the University of Tasmania, 1858 to 1889 ............................................................. 83

Sir Walter Watson Hughes and The University of Adelaide, 1874 ..................................................... 84

University Endowment and the University of Western Australia, 1904 to 1911 ............................... 85

The University of Queensland, 1906 .................................................................................................. 86

The University of New South Wales, 1949 ......................................................................................... 87

Heredity and State Jurisdictions, 1850 to 1950 ................................................................................. 90

THE HIGHER EDUCATION PUBLIC POLICY CYCLE: A COMMONWEALTH PERSPECTIVE ........................... 91

The Onset of Commonwealth Financing Legislation, 1900 to 1950 .................................................. 91

States Grants (Universities) Act 1951 ................................................................................................ 94

HEREDITY AND JURISDICTIONS SUMMARY OF FINDINGS ....................................................................... 96

CHAPTER SIX: HEREDITY AND COMPLEXITY ...................................................................................... 105

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EVOLUTION OF FINANCING LEGISLATION: NEW SOUTH WALES, VICTORIA AND TASMANIA, 1850 TO

1950 ..................................................................................................................................................... 106

New South Wales – Evening Lectures .............................................................................................. 106

Victoria – Agricultural Education ..................................................................................................... 111

The Tasmanian Contribution ........................................................................................................... 114

EVOLUTION OF COMMONWEALTH FINANCING LEGISLATION, 1951 TO 2020 ..................................... 117

States Grants and Related Acts Schedules, 1951 to 1988 ................................................................ 118

Higher Education Funding Act 1988 ................................................................................................ 123

MORE OR LESS: THE EVOLVING OBJECTIVES OF AUSTRALIAN HIGHER EDUCATION ............................ 125

Higher Education Funding Act 1988 ................................................................................................ 126

Higher Education Support Act 2003 ................................................................................................. 127

HEREDITY AND COMPLEXITY SUMMARY OF FINDINGS ........................................................................ 129

CHAPTER SEVEN: ADAPTIVE PRESSURES MEDIATING HEREDITY ....................................................... 139

HIGHER EDUCATION PERSPECTIVES ON ADAPTIVE PRESSURE ............................................................. 140

Expanding Frontiers and Segmentation of Knowledge .................................................................... 141

Serving the University, Or the University Serving Society? .............................................................. 143

Social and Economic Demand for Higher Education ........................................................................ 145

Financing Legislation in a Global Context ........................................................................................ 148

It’s the Economy, Stupid! ................................................................................................................. 150

PUBLIC POLICY PERSPECTIVES ON ADAPTIVE PRESSURE ...................................................................... 151

A Public Policy History of Higher Education Financing Legislation .................................................. 151

Stability and Reform Across Financing Legislation Sub-Systems ..................................................... 153

ADAPTIVE PRESSURES AND HEREDITY SUMMARY OF FINDINGS .......................................................... 159

CHAPTER EIGHT: HEREDITY AND THE FUTURE OF AUSTRALIAN HIGHER EDUCATION ........................ 169

THE CURRENT COSTS OF HIGHER EDUCATION LEGISLATION ............................................................... 170

Regulatory Burden ........................................................................................................................... 170

Parliamentary Distraction ............................................................................................................... 171

TOWARDS STABLE AND SUSTAINABLE AUSTRALIAN HIGHER EDUCATION FINANCING ....................... 174

COMPONENTS OF A POST-UNIVERSAL PARTICIPATION LEGISLATION SUB-SYSTEM ............................ 177

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Reinvigorating Australian Legislatures ............................................................................................ 178

Legislated Institutional Diversity ..................................................................................................... 179

Anticipating Adaptive Pressures ...................................................................................................... 181

Consolidation ................................................................................................................................... 182

Governance and Accountability ....................................................................................................... 183

Summary of Components of a Post-universal Participation Legislation Sub-system ....................... 184

CHAPTER NINE: HEREDITY AS AN ANALYTIC TOOL ............................................................................ 191

BIBLIOGRAPHY ................................................................................................................................. 196

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TABLE OF FIGURES

Figure 1. Commonwealth Financing Legislation, 1920 to 1988 ................................................. 30

Figure 2. State and Territory Financing Legislation, 1850 to 1950 ............................................. 31

Figure 3. Heredity – An Integrated Higher Education Public Policy Cycle .................................. 53

Figure 4. Heredity of Higher Education Mapped to Biglan’s Classification ................................ 62

Figure 5. Criteria for Selection of Legislation and Analysis ......................................................... 65

Figure 6. Heredity and the Onset of Higher Education by States, 1850 to 1911 ....................... 91

Figure 7. Heredity and the Onset of Commonwealth Financing Legislation, 1850 to 1950 ....... 97

Figure 8. Heredity and Complexity in New South Wales and Victoria, 1850 to 1950 .............. 114

Figure 9. Heredity and Complexity in Tasmania, 1889 to 1935 ............................................... 117

Figure 10. Heredity and Complexity, Commonwealth, 1951 to 2020 ....................................... 125

Figure 11. An Integrated View of Heredity and Complexity ..................................................... 130

Figure 12. Heredity and Higher Education Adaptive Pressures ............................................... 151

Figure 13. Heredity and Higher Education and Policy Adaptive Pressures .............................. 161

Figure 14. Commonwealth Expenditure on Higher Education, 1999 to 2020 .......................... 172

Figure 15. Heredity and the Future of Australian Higher Education Legislation ...................... 177

Figure 16. Components of a Post-universal Participation Legislation Sub-system .................. 184

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TABLE OF TABLES

Table 1. Select Australian Higher Education Legislation Amendment Count ............................. 28

Table 2. Financing Legislation Categorisation Criteria ............................................................... 69

Table 3. Claims About Heredity Embedded in the University of Sydney Act 1850 .................... 78

Table 4. Comparison of Heredity Claims Between the University of Sydney Act 1850 and the University of Melbourne Act 1853 .............................................................................................. 80

Table 5. Comparison of Heredity Claims Between the University and University Colleges Act 1900–1948 and New South Wales University of Technology Act 1949 ...................................... 88

Table 6. Higher Education Statistics, Select Universities, 1950 .................................................. 94

Table 7. Accumulation of Activity in Select Financing Legislation, 1951 to 1984 ..................... 121

Table 8. Items of Financing Legislation Passed by Legislature by Decade, 1850 to 1950 ........ 154

Table 9. Commonwealth Budget Expenditure, Select Categories, 1949 to 1953 ..................... 158

Table 10. University Revenue Derived from State and Local Government, 2018 .................... 179

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ABBREVIATIONS AND ACRONYMS

ABS Australian Bureau of Statistics

ANU Australian National University

AVCC Australian Vice-Chancellors Committee

Cth Commonwealth

CSIR Council for Scientific and Industrial Research

CSIRO Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation

ESOS Education Services for Overseas Students Act

HEFA Higher Education Funding Act

HESA Higher Education Support Act

IPA Institute of Public Affairs

NHMRC National Health and Medical Research Council

NSW New South Wales

OCR Optical Character Recognition

PDF Portable Document Format

OECD Organization for Economic and Cultural Development

QLD Queensland

SA South Australia

TAS Tasmania

TEQSA Tertiary Education and Quality Standards Agency

VIC Victoria

WA Western Australia

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CHAPTER ONE: INTRODUCING HEREDITY AND HIGHER EDUCATION

Naturally, my analysis of the heredity of universities is incomplete. But I hope I have said enough to support my argument. It is for creative writers to try to tell us what the environment of tomorrow’s world will be like. But we already know what its heredity will be like. Its men and women will carry our chromosomes and our personalities. Its universities will carry an inheritance which we can already identify. This inheritance will lie beneath all sorts of accretions, new functions, complex organizations. But the inheritance defines the prime purpose of the university.

Eric Ashby (1968) The case for ivory towers.1

The effort to think about what higher education will look like in 20 or 40 years forces us to think more clearly about the historical forces that have shaped American higher education’s unique qualities and character. Eric Ashby has said that we can-not know “what the environments of tomorrow’s world will be like,” but “we already know what its heredity will be like”.

Martin Trow (1988) American higher education: Past, present, and future.2

THE FUTURE OF AUSTRALIAN HIGHER EDUCATION

The tomorrow that Eric Ashby spoke about at a conference to celebrate the sesquicentennial of the University of Michigan has arrived. 2020 is likely to be remembered as an important point in world history. Assumptions embedded in the strategic and operational plans of Australian universities leading into this year did not foresee the impact of the pandemic currently faced. Ashby’s reminder that the future is difficult to predict is salient. It does little to ease anxiety one might feel, nor generate predictions about how universities might change in a post-pandemic world. No matter what changes may arise, Ashby’s claims about heredity remain true. Essential features of Australian higher education evident today constitute the inheritance of the higher education system of the future. The sector of today is perhaps unrecognisable from institutions of Ashby’s era, although retain some essential characteristics. Some of these will be shared by all universities. At the same event, Alexandr Alexandrov suggests that all science will “sooner or later, attain mutual understanding; the more objective are the data and the more strict the logical reasoning used as arguments, the easier this is attained”.3 The scientific method will eventually converge on the truth. The institutions that house and refine this method may, however, organise themselves and transmit their inheritance across time in different ways. We have no clear means of defining what characteristics might be inherited, nor the processes by which these characteristics might be transmitted. This “heredity of Australian higher education” is defined by this dissertation.

At the time of his University of Michigan address, Ashby was Master of Clare College, and Vice-Chancellor elect at Cambridge University. This might place Ashby as irrelevant to the heredity of Australian higher education, but he exerts considerable influence. Ashby was a Professor of Botany at the University of Sydney, former chair of the Australian National Research Council, and touted as inaugural Vice-Chancellor of the Australian National University. Ashby instead became Vice-Chancellor of Queen’s University Belfast, a stepping-stone to Cambridge.4 Ashby’s Clare College appointment was part of a broader transformation of Cambridge

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University. He was tasked with “a radical liberalisation of admissions policy that would allow the recruitment of able undergraduates whatever their provenance and social background”.5

I was yet to exist at this point but was lucky enough to be born into an era in which my passage through schooling coincided with marked expansion of access and participation in higher education; Ashby’s admissions liberalisation project on a global scale. One’s genetic and social inheritance tends to be deterministic of one’s future. Life chances track closely with one’s starting position on the social ladder. Higher education is often characterised as the transformative mechanism that enables social mobility. It enables those from lower rungs to climb to a position better aligned with the combination of innate ability and endeavour.

My personal experience of higher education is one of transformation. On the balance of probabilities, and with a working-class and Deaf family background, it is unusual that I have climbed multiple rungs of the social and economic ladder.6 My upbringing included time in one of Australia’s most deprived localities. Within a generation, my daughter is bestowed with an inheritance that comes with postgraduate-qualified professional parents living in a high-socioeconomic status area. University is expected, not exceptional. More broadly, university is no longer exceptional for those from working-class and disadvantaged backgrounds. Some cohorts remain underrepresented, but the probability of participation in higher education has increased dramatically across every “provenance and social background” since the 1960s. This experience of transformation is a catalyst for this dissertation. The aim is, however, to transcend the personal and better understand the processes by which the Australian higher education system has been transformed from obscure origins to a high-participation system in which individual transformations are made possible on an unprecedented scale. Further, how these transformations might be maintained and enhanced into the world of tomorrow.

At this point, we cannot know what scale of change Australian higher education may experience in the years ahead. Predicting the future necessitates creative imagining by those with that disposition. Creative imagining will be more plausible if informed by deeper knowledge of the inheritance possessed by higher education today, the mechanisms that mediate the transmission of heritable characteristics across time, and the processes by which the system has evolved beyond previously assumed constraints. Defining and understanding patterns of stability and change in higher education depends on one’s vantage point. Individual students learn and can be transformed by their higher education experiences. Researchers can nudge, and at times create, frontiers of knowledge. Research translation ensures knowledge can be applied for the betterment of society. The institutional form of the university is adept to change, evident in the creation and absorption of new disciplines and functions, at times in lock step with universities from far afield.7 Societies mould their higher education systems to cater to their specific social, economic and cultural preferences.8 This variety of perspectives spanning individual and global systems is symptomatic of higher education’s inherent complexity. Doctoral work in this context is, by definition, a challenging exercise. The breadth and quality of work already published makes it more difficult for emerging researchers to grasp the intricacies of the field, to identify gaps in the literature, and generate novel insights warranting conferral of a doctoral award.

A repeated approach for grappling with higher education’s innate complexity is to borrow concepts from other disciplines, particularly those concerned with categorising and abstraction of the natural world. Ashby’s heredity emerges from his botanical disciplinary home. Ronald

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Barnett appropriates the ecosystem in “the coming of the ecological university”.9 Barnett describes the evolution of universities across time from origins as metaphysical institutions during the medieval period to the research university dominant in the 20th century. This gave rise to the entrepreneurial university. Barnett suggests that through a philosophically informed but creative imagining, the university will transition into an ecological institution, embodied by networks across society serving the interests of the world.

Several points relevant to change in higher education can be drawn from Barnett. Change is an inherent part of higher education, implicit in the transition of forms of universities. Higher education is primarily associated with the institutional form of the university; scholars of education spend comparatively less time on the idea of higher education institutions that are not universities. The institutional form of the university has proven to be markedly durable across the centuries.10 This durability necessitates a macro perspective to heredity, acknowledging the long history of higher education systems and societies within which they are embedded. Finally, the durability of the university relies on an institutional propensity to catalyse and accommodate change across long time horizons. Governments rise and fall; political and social movements ebb and flow; war, genocide11 and pestilence may temporarily disrupt operations; but the university somehow endures.

ADVOCACY FOR A DIFFERENT FUTURE

Australian universities are comprehensive institutions encompassing many disciplines and professions. Shorthand for this internal complexity, or “city of infinite variety” is the term “multiversity”.12 Almost all Australian universities are, at this point, multiversities, operating with a scale and breadth of activity that is different to the smaller institutions from which they emerged. This is also distinct from smaller, specialised universities observed in other parts of the world. This internal complexity may explain the resilience of comprehensive universities as institutions; Darwinian natural selection within a multiplicity of specialised fields of knowledge and academic structures ensuring only those of social, economic and political relevance survive.

The processes that have shaped universities and the higher education system observed today are central to this dissertation. What can be inferred from the history of higher education, and the university, that might explain its current and future state? How has the university interacted with various internal and external forces to shape its current form? What, if any, predictive insight can be gleaned from these perspectives that might help us understand what the university and higher education sector of tomorrow might look like?

There is extensive literature that, like Ashby, dissects the history, nature and future challenges facing higher education and universities. Forsyth traces the history of the modern Australian university.13 Davis outlines the distinctive Australian idea of the university and explores its potential disruption and future.14 There is an element of lament to this literature, with Collini questioning, “What are universities for?”15 and Readings asserting that the university is in a “state of ruins”.16 Gaita has questioned whether an institution can call itself a university without a philosophy department.17. Various consulting firms have taken to publishing their views of how universities should change and better serve social and economic needs whilst adapting to various forces of disruption.18

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This dissertation avoids a normative position adopted by the many who suggest higher education should or must transform itself into a new state. Instead, it accepts that higher education has demonstrably changed at various points across its history, and suggests it is highly probable that it will change in future. This dissertation asks different questions, with emphasis on the transmission of characteristics from the past to the future, and processes that enable or impede change across time. Insights into the nature of change in higher education may provide those adopting more normative positions with tools to engage with change-related processes more effectively.

Change in higher education is of significant scholarly and public interest when considered from the perspective of patterns of policy reform. Between 2003 and 2019, the Higher Education Support Act 2003 Cth – the primary legislative instrument for distributing government subsidies to Australian universities – was amended 69 times; an average of over four times per year.19 This makes change the norm rather than the exception. There is limited literature that quantifies the level of policy reform occurring in Australian higher education, or which interrogates the factors that cause this outcome.

Conversely, stability can be considered the norm rather than the exception. Despite regular legislative change, macro features of higher education financing change only gradually. Conventional recent policy narratives demonstrated concern with major growth in the Commonwealth Grant Scheme arising from demand-driven funding.20 This growth has, however, coincided with a reduction in other forms of higher education expenditure, resulting in a net slow but steady reduction in the proportion of Commonwealth expenditure allocated to higher education.21 We spend too much, and yet spend less simultaneously, whilst legislating near continuously.

The combination of normative positions on how higher education should change, inconsistencies between observed patterns of legislative change, and observed stability in macro features of the higher education system, suggest there is a pressing need to better understand change in Australian higher education. To better understand this change, this dissertation adopts a novel research design inspired by Ashby’s speech on the future of ivory towers,22 and Martin Trow’s writings about the past, present and future of American higher education.23

HEREDITY AND HIGHER EDUCATION

As financial product disclosure statements regularly remind us, past performance is no guarantee of future performance. This truism also applies to the future of Australian higher education. Notwithstanding caveats one might place around predicting the future, there is useful work to be undertaken in identifying how the inheritance of Australian higher education might be codified. A clearer understanding of whether some characteristics are more or less likely to endure might inform policy actors and leaders to focus attention on matters of more enduring importance. There is not, however, an extensive tradition in higher education scholarship around ideas of “inheritance” or “heredity” from which this doctoral study might draw upon.

The cited references to heredity thus far – Ashby and Trow – take on different perspectives in their use of the term. Ashby’s focus is internal and on the importance of university traditions. The mechanisms by which heredity operates and allows traits transmitted is social and

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involves three key dimensions: social pressure for students to enter the system; “suction pressures” in the economic demand for manpower; and the internal logic of the system. The final point is illustrated by his evocative description of university governance as “constellations of anarchy”.24 Trow’s framing of heredity is more external, giving greater recognition to the role of the state and market as coordinating forces.25 The state, in particular, is singled out for its financing power, with inferences drawn from trends in state financing of higher education across America.

Two remarks from esteemed figures in the history and scholarship of higher education do not make for a research tradition in the heredity of higher education. In both cases, heredity is used conceptually and metaphorically, recognising that what can be observed today is likely to influence the future, but without a causal mechanism of transmission of heritable characteristics beyond vague notions of university culture and tradition (Ashby) and extrapolation of trend data (Trow). This dissertation is inspired by Ashby and Trow but adopts a new and different framing. Like Ashby, it borrows from the biological sciences and utilises a conceptual model of heredity that embeds a causal mechanism for the transmission and evolution of inherited characteristics.

THE HEREDITY MECHANISM

Deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA) is the blueprint for life. It encodes instructions for the assembly of proteins from amino acids that catalyse a range of physiological processes central to cellular form, function and interaction. My DNA genotype has interacted with my environment to produce the person I am today; my phenotype, warts and all. All life is the culmination of an evolutionary process in which DNA is replicated and refined through natural selection; a process that began in the primordial soup of proto-organic molecules billions of years ago.

The origins of Australian higher education can be traced back to discussions amongst inhabitants of the Colony of New South Wales in 1849. Esteem for the idea of the university, and what a local university might do for the “advancement of religion and morality and the promotion of useful knowledge”,26 catalysed a legislative process that ultimately led to the University of Sydney Act 1850. The colonial primordial soup from which Australian higher education was formed is the result of a legislative process, that we would today understand as a public policy process, or policy cycle, codified through legislation and other policy artefacts, which set the tone for the higher education system of today. Public policy artefacts can be understood metaphorically as the genetic code that interacts with a broader social context to give rise to the phenotype of Australian higher education. Equating legislation to genetic code is not of spontaneous origin. This framing of heredity is drawn from Clark Kerr’s The Uses of the University.27 In rejecting various biological metaphors put forward for describing the university, Kerr suggests that it is better understood as a:

mechanism held together by administrative rules and powered by money.28

This public policy and legislative framing of heredity as “administrative rules” provides a mechanism through with the inheritance of higher education can be defined. The processes by which higher education legislation is made and amended allows this research to trace the lineage of higher education today. The heritability of various traits can be assessed. The accretion of new “genes” can be traced, and the relationship with an evolving, complex social

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context can be quantified. Interactions between system genotype, environment and phenotype provide insights into the heredity of Australian higher education.

There are alternative interpretations of inheritance and heredity in higher education that must be recognised before elaborating on, refining and applying the “policy as genetic material” conceptual model of heredity. The disciplines that comprise universities operate within their own epistemological and methodological conventions, sustained and refined across time. The knowledge embedded within disciplines is codified in publications, proofed through peer review, and perpetuated through citations and reuse of text and ideas. These ideas are integrated within the curriculum through what Basil Bernstein described as the pedagogical device.29 Teaching is another process in which the inheritance of higher education is transmitted and maintained. Bernstein’s disciplinary home of sociology has a broader tradition that examines social norms and change. Bourdieu’s social reproduction describes the process by which culture is transmitted across generations.30 Other sociological perspectives include policy genealogy – emerging from the work of Foucault – exploring the rules embedded in discourse that produce the accepted truth.31 Policy genealogy has been used to examine how policy has changed over time, to problematise the policy process, and to better understand the involvement of policy actors in the policy change process.32

Like sociology, public policy literature explores how policy is maintained and reproduced. Public policy would refer to this as path dependency,33 with its own language for describing mechanisms by which policy choices and decisions can be locked-in and institutionalised.34 Understanding barriers to change, and defining forces that maintain the status quo, is another synonym of inheritance and heredity for which there is a broader literature.35 Potentially spanning all perspectives on heredity is the history of higher education, from which the past can be examined from a range of perspectives, such as institutions,36 professions,37 and interactions with broader society.38

What is missing across these disciplinary corollaries to heredity is a specific focus on higher education legislation, in Australia and internationally. Many of the perspectives on heredity described in the paragraphs above may draw upon legislation as a reference point to explore discipline-specific paradigms and propositions, but do not specifically and systematically examine legislation as a core feature of a conceptual paradigm. This is a gap in the broad canon of literature through which this doctoral study seeks to contribute incremental progress. This also situates this research as a multidisciplinary study of higher education, not a sociological, public policy or historical study for which higher education just happens to be the theme of study.

Several challenges are confronted in advancing an understanding of heredity of Australian higher education. This dissertation suggests that legislation (and other policy instruments) are a mechanism through which higher education’s inheritance is codified and transmitted across time. There is a limited literature that explores the ways in which Australian higher education has been legislated.39 The broader public policy literature tends to position legislation as a minor feature of broader policy sub-systems in which legislation originates and is implemented.40 Exploration of the heritability of traits embedded within legislation across long time horizons brings into frame a huge volume of policy documents and artefacts. There is no shortage of legislation to examine, no shortage of documents associated with the policymaking process, and no shortage of policy actors involved in the legislative process.

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These challenges are addressed through a research design that balances trade-offs between analytical depth and breadth.

The Australian system has a strong public orientation, and the public policy process leaves an extensive trail of data and information that can be scrutinised. A key output of the public policy process is the legislative “genetic code”. A focus on legislation does not ignore or trivialise the broader policy context but does narrow the number of policy artefacts within the scope for analysis. A focus on financing legislation further reduces the volume of legislative reference points to a more manageable level. Financing legislation neatly combines Kerr’s administrative rules and money metaphor. Financing legislation does, however, stretch the metaphor from intra-institutional administrative rules to law, passed by parliaments. Financing legislation for the purposes of this research is defined as higher education-related legislation with a direct and explicit reference to the distribution of public funds, or right to access private funds, and any subsequent amendments to this legislation.

Further refinement of scope is achieved by the analysis of Australian higher education financing legislation through a specific theoretical stance, with emphasis on the context in which legislation is made, and the higher education context enabled by legislation. Australia is a constitutional monarchy and federation of states. Universities have been established under state, territory and Commonwealth legislation, although the Commonwealth holds responsibility for higher education funding. Each jurisdiction serves as a distinct policy context, which will influence the heredity of higher education.

There can be no “university” or higher education system without grappling with elusive and difficult to measure issues of knowledge.41 Knowledge-related functions are central to academic work and the disciplinary building blocks of universities. Disciplinary building blocks will also influence the heredity of higher education. Disciplines are housed within institutions that are the recipients of public funding, with institutional references within financing legislation another means of understanding the heredity of higher education. Institutions interact with broader society, with rising levels of engagement across time. Martin Trow’s seminal categorisation of elite, mass and universal participation systems42 provides a means of understanding changing patterns of participation that will also influence the system’s heredity. The trend towards high levels of participation is a global phenomenon, which places Marginson’s work into “high-participation higher education systems”;43 another lens through which heredity can be explored.

Many features of higher education financing policy will be excluded from analysis through adopting this stance. It is recognised that there are consequential limits to claims that can be made about the heredity of Australian higher education. Nonetheless, jurisdictions, disciplines, institutions and university interactions with Australian and global society provide a high-level analytical framework through which to examine the heredity of Australian higher education.

RESEARCH QUESTIONS

To ponder the future of Australian higher education and to think critically about heredity is an important exercise. To ponder without focus does not constitute research and would not be an exercise worthy of a doctoral dissertation. There is a need to clarify the underlying problem being examined, and carefully frame the research questions to be answered. Simply put, this dissertation seeks to answer a question:

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What is the heredity of Australian higher education?

This is inspired by Ashby and Trow, both of whom used heredity to explore the past, present and future of higher education. It emerges from doctoral candidature that has grappled with the nature of change in higher education, motivated by reflections of transformation at a personal level, and more broad contemplation of change across the history of the Australian system. It recognises the complexity evident in higher education and refines the scope by analysing interactions between higher education and society (internationally and nationally), the institution, and academic disciplines informed by the work of Marginson, Trow, Kerr and Clark respectively.

The research design responds to defining the research question by framing the process by which heredity operates as a set of interactions within the Australian public policy context. This ultimately manifests in legislation that enables a higher education system to arise and operate. Through such operations, higher education interacts with the public policy context, establishing a feedback loop that shapes future legislation. This framing is consistent with descriptive and theoretical models of public policy, particularly those relating to the policy cycle.44

There is little in the literature that explores patterns of legislation in Australian higher education across its history. Examining all higher education legislation would be excessive and unmanageable, and, as such, the scope is narrowed from all higher education legislation to financing legislation. This choice is informed by Kerr’s quip around administrative rules and money, and Trow’s emphasis on state financing as a feature of the heredity of American higher education.

The research question is further refined to: What is the heredity of Australian higher education financing legislation. This, too, is a broad question, and therefore sub-questions are put forward at a high and exploratory level:

1) To what extent is Australian higher education financing legislation influenced by the legislative and policy context in which this legislation arises?

2) What patterns are observed in Australian higher education financing legislation across jurisdictions and across its history, spanning 1850 to 2020?

3) What is the relative importance of environmental adaptive pressures catalysing the introduction and amendment of Australian higher education financing legislation, evident within legislation and key stages of the policymaking process, specifically:

a. disciplinary structures and conventions b. institutional factors broadly consistent with “the uses of the university” c. broader society, manifesting as specific responses to social and economic

demands d. references to global developments in higher education.

4) What practical relevance can be gleaned from an appreciation of the heredity of Australian higher education?

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DISSERTATION STRUCTURE

To answer these questions, Chapter Two first explores literature around what we know about change in Australian higher education financing legislation. This demonstrates the absence of an integrated theory of how higher education legislation is constructed and has evolved in Australia.

Chapter Three looks further afield and examines explanations of policymaking and change within and beyond Australia, drawing upon both higher education and public policy literature. This chapter culminates with a conceptual model of heredity that integrates higher education and public policy cycles operating within Australia.

Chapter Four further elaborates on the model of heredity and describes the methods by which legislation will be selected and scrutinised.

Chapter Five applies the heredity model across the jurisdictions in which financing legislation is enacted. State and Commonwealth financing legislation is reviewed from the point of origin to the immediate aftermath of World War II. This chapter highlights jurisdictional similarities and differences in the formulation of higher education financing legislation.

Chapter Six examines the evolution of financing legislation across time, documenting a pattern of proliferation of financed activity, intermittent consolidation and general trend towards complexity.

Chapter Seven examines evidence of adaptive pressure arising from disciplinary, institutional, social, economic and global systems’ factors in the evolution of financing legislation.

Chapter Eight explores the challenges associated with contemporary financing legislation. The cost of contemporary legislative complexity is described and a path to more stable and sustainable financing legislation is explored.

Chapter Nine puts forward a summary of findings and explores how the conceptual model of heredity framework described might be further refined and applied.

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1 Eric Ashby, “The case for ivory towers,” Higher education in tomorrow’s world: A symposium of the International Conference of Higher Education Commemorating the Sesquicentennial of the University of Michigan, April 26–29, 1967, ed, Algo. D. Henderson, (University of Michigan, 1968), 17.

2 Martin Trow, “American higher education: Past, present, and future,” Educational Researcher, 17, no. 3 (1998): 13 -23.

3 Alexander Alexandrov, “Promoting mutual understanding,” Higher education in tomorrow’s world: A symposium of the International Conference of Higher Education Commemorating the Sesquicentennial of the University of Michigan, April 26–29, 1967, ed, Algo. D. Henderson, (University of Michigan, 1968), 142.

4 John Heslop-Harrison, “Eric Ashby, Baron Ashby, of Brandon, Suffolk, Kt, 24 August 1904–22 October 1992,” Biographical Memoirs of Fellows of The Royal Society, 41, (1995): 2-18.

5 Ibid, 10.

6 Matthew Brett, “My father was a working class deaf man,” Expression Australia, published 11 January 2013, https://www.expression.com.au/news.asp?aid=497.

7 David John Frank and Jay Gabler, Reconstructing the university: Worldwide shifts in academia in the 20th century (Stanford University Press, 2006).

8 Burton Clark’s “triangle of coordination” highlights the varying influence of the academic oligarchy, the market and state in shaping higher education systems across the world: Burton Clark, The higher education system: Academic organization in cross-national perspective (University of California Press, 1983).

9 Ronald Barnett, “The coming of the ecological university,” Oxford Review of Education, 37, no. 4 (2011): 439–455.

10 A case in point for this claim is Ashby’s address at the 150-year anniversary of the University of Michigan, and the origins of the University of Cambridge, where Ashby was employed at the time, with a history some five times longer stretching back to 1209.

11 Nishamura Masao describes the role of the university in the cultural reconstruction of Cambodia after the genocidal regime of Pol Pot: Nishimura Masao, “Reestablishing national identity by reevaluating a nation’s past—A university’s effort to recover from war in the late 1990s Cambodia: An ethnographic account.” In Natural Disaster and Reconstruction in Asian Economies, ed Kinnia Yau Shuk-ting, (Palgrave Macmillan, New York, 2013), 173-183.

12 Clark Kerr, The uses of the university (Harvard University Press, 2005), 31.

13 Hannah Forsyth, A history of the modern Australian university (NewSouth Publishing, 2014).

14 Glyn Davis, The Australian idea of a university (Melbourne University Publishing, 2017).

15 Stefan Collini, What are universities for? (Penguin, 2012).

16 Bill Readings, The university in ruins. (Harvard University Press, 1996).

17 Raymond Gaita, “To civilise the city?” Meanjin, 71 no. 1 (2012): 64.

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18 See Justin Bokor, University of the future: A thousand year old industry on the cusp of profound change (Ernst & Young, Australia, 2012).; Stephen Parker, Andrew Dempster and Mark Warburton, Reimagining tertiary education: From binary system to ecosystem (KPMG, Australia, 2018).; and Robert Griew, Three lessons from a decade of higher education policy stalemate (Nous Group, Australia, 2018).

19 Amendments to the Higher Education Support Act 2003 Cth are listed both in Endnotes to the legislation and in the Federal Register of Legislation – Australian Government: https://www.legislation.gov.au/Series/C2004A01234/Amendments.

20 Australian Government, Driving innovation, fairness and excellence in Australian higher education (Australian Government, Canberra, 2016).

21 Final Budget Outcome statements for higher education demonstrate a consistent reduction in the proportion of Commonwealth expenditure on higher education from 2006/07 to 2019/20. This pattern is documented in Figure 14 on page 172. Australian Government, Commonwealth Budget, various years https://archive.budget.gov.au.

22 Ashby, “The Case for Ivory Towers”; An edited version of Eric Ashby’s conference address was also published: Eric Ashby, “Ivory Towers in Tomorrow’s World,” Journal of Higher Education, 38, no. 8 (1967): 417-427.

23 Trow, “American higher education: Past, present, and future”.

24 Ashby, “The Case for Ivory Towers”; 9.

25 Trow, “American higher education: Past, present, and future”.

26 University of Sydney Act 1850 (NSW). s.1. Noting that whilst the espoused “advancement of religion and morality and the promotion of useful knowledge” is embedded within opening text for this Act, the University also espouses secular values, s20. that “no religious test shall be administered to any person in order to entitle him to be admitted as a Student”. The genetic code of legislation needs to be read holistically, with various clauses interacting with each other, and maybe expressed differentially as clauses are interpreted and applied within a complex social system.

27 Kerr, The uses of the university.

28 Ibid, 15.

29 Basil Bernstein, Class, codes and control 2nd edition (Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1974).

30 Pierre Bourdieu and Jean-Claude Passeron, Reproduction in education, society, and culture (1990 ed). / preface by Pierre Bourdieu (Sage in association with Theory, Culture & Society, Dept of Administrative and Social Studies, Teesside Polytechnic, 1990).

31 Elise Hunkin, “Deploying Foucauldian genealogy: Critiquing ‘quality’ reform in early childhood policy in Australia,” Power and Education, 8, no. 1 (2016): 35–53.

32 Trevor Gale, “Critical policy sociology: Historiography, archaeology and genealogy as methods of policy analysis,” Journal of Education Policy, 16, no. 5 (2001): 379–393.

33 Ian Greener, “The potential of path dependence in political studies,” Politics, 25, no. 1 (2005): 62–72.

34 Claudio. M, Radaelli, Bruno Dente, and Samuele Dossi, “Recasting institutionalism: Institutional analysis and public policy,” European Political Science, 11, no. 4 (2012): 537–550.

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35 Various models include: Punctuated Equilibrium Theory; Frank. R. Baumgartner and Bryan. D. Jones, Agendas and instability in American politics (University of Chicago Press, 2010).; the advocacy coalition framework; Hank. C. Jenkins-Smith, and Paul. A. Sabatier, “Evaluating the advocacy coalition framework,” Journal of Public Policy, 14, no. 2 (1994): 175–203.; and multiple streams; John W. Kingdon, Agendas, Alternatives, and Public Policies (Little, Brown, 1984).

36 Richard Joseph Wheeler Selleck, The Shop: The University of Melbourne, 1850-1939 (Melbourne Univ. Publishing, 2003).

37 Kate Darian-Smith and James Waghorne, The first world war, the universities and the professions in Australia 1914–1939 (Melbourne University Publishing, 2019).

38 Julia Horne and Geoffrey Sherington, “Extending the educational franchise: The social contract of Australia’s public universities, 1850–1890,” Paedagogica Historica, 46, no. 1–2 (2010): 207–227.

39 Jackon and Varnham provide an overview of the law for educators, covering school and university law in Australia. There is, however, little beyond this surface description of the law content consistent with a taxonomy of Australian higher education legislation that describes how different elements interact with each other, or evolve across time: James G Jackson and Sally Varnham, Law for educators: School and university law in Australia (LexisNexis Butterworths, Chatswood, NSW, 2007).

40 Daniel. A. Mazmanian and Paul. A. Sabatier, Implementation and public policy with a new postscript (University of America Press, 1989).

41 Clark, The higher education system: Academic organization in cross-national perspective, 236.

42 Martin Trow, Problems in the transition from elite to mass higher education (Carnegie Commission on Higher Education, 1973).

43 Simon Marginson, “The worldwide trend to high participation higher education: Dynamics of social stratification in inclusive systems,” Higher Education, 72, no. 4 (2016): 413–434.

44 Cairney provides an overview of the field of public policy in: Paul Cairney, Understanding public policy: Theories and issues (Palgrave Macmillan 2012). In the Australian context, the process of policymaking and implementation is described in: Catherine Althaus, Peter Bridgman, and Glyn Davis, The Australian policy handbook (Allen & Unwin, Sydney, 2007).

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CHAPTER TWO: AUSTRALIAN HIGHER EDUCATION POLICY AND LEGISLATION

We choose a path and thereafter it leads us – the “deep lane insists on the direction”, as TS Eliot wrote in East Coker. The further we go, the more we commit to this course; other choices fall behind, those paths not taken. Over time, this seems the only road possible. For universities in Australia, the path chosen early still guides the bearing. An Australian idea of a university, developed in colonial society but keenly influenced by British heritage, has shaped all local universities since 1850.

Glyn Davis (2017). The Australian idea of a university.1

The inspiration for progressing an understanding of the heredity of Australian higher education through its financing legislation is drawn from Eric Ashby. Ashby’s training as a botanist emphasised biological metaphor, with heredity the resulting semantic choice to explore the relationship between the past, present and future of higher education. Some 60 years later, Glyn Davis, Vice-Chancellor of the University of Melbourne, the Cambridge of the “Global South”,2 embarked on a similar exercise. In The Australian idea of a university, Davis considers the “steady expansion of a single model”3 of higher education that took root and matured in Australia, and the extent to which this model might withstand future challenges. Davis’s training in public policy emphasises path dependency for his conceptual framing and semantic choice, embodied within the quip that Australia has “just one university with around 220 campuses”.4

Ashby and Davis approach a similar topic from distinct disciplinary perspectives. Both, however, see higher education from the vantage point of the vice-chancellor of globally renowned universities. Few higher education scholars reach this position, and one can look upwards from lower rungs with vertigo. What might this research contribute when others more senior, more learned and more experienced have eloquently explored similar ideas to make plausible claims of the future?

The challenge with any research is to understand and build upon the existing archive of knowledge. In Raewyn Connell’s exploration of The good university, the research process is described as a “mist-covered researchable zone”, where “defining a researchable question” is an art that eventually finds “a path forward through the mist, into that zone”.5 This chapter delves into the archive of knowledge about Australian higher education. This archive, and that of higher education policy, is extensive, accessible and visible. It includes a vast repository of information accumulated by various social, policy and higher education processes. The exploration of this repository finds an opaque fog shrouding anything approximating an integrated theorisation of Australian higher education legislation, financing or otherwise.

The archive contains more information than any individual can process about Australian higher education. There is a specific code for research into higher education6 that intersects with a wide range of topics. Despite the breadth and complexity of the archive, there is little that relates specifically to legislation, nor to the heredity of the system. To substantiate this proposition, it is worth noting that, at the time of writing, the phrase “Australian higher education financing legislation” can be found only within this dissertation, or in references to

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this doctoral candidature.7 One could purposefully strive for a similar outcome, a random assemblage of wording to find unique combinations and variants. However, the phrase “Australian higher education financing legislation” does not arise spontaneously. Ill-fated attempts to liberalise student fees in Australian higher education included the establishment of an expert panel to provide advice on key policy matters – the Legislation and Financing Working Group.8 Legislation and financing are close companions, even if this precise phrasing is not widely used.

An explanation for the paucity of literature about Australian higher education legislation is that legislation is mere artefact of more important social and cultural processes. This is a valid position, and there is much in the archive that describes how social and cultural forces interact with higher education. However, in moving into the researchable zone around the heredity of higher education, and the legislative mechanism by which inherited characteristics can be transmitted, it is clear that the shelves of the archive are sparsely populated.

The vast repository of knowledge can impose challenges for researchers seeking to come to terms with its breadth, depth and intricacies. Understanding at least part of the archive is one thing, expressing one’s knowledge of the archive in a coherent form is another challenge altogether. A convenient mechanism for cutting corners in coherent description of the archive might be to adopt the position of Polanyi in that, “we know much more than we can tell”.9 This is unlikely to persuade any examiner that there is mastery of the field. As such, the following sections describe key elements of the repository relevant to Australian higher education financing legislation.

HIGHER EDUCATION POLICY AND LEGISLATION TODAY

Australia operates within an overarching legal framework consistent with it being a democratic nation and constitutional monarchy. Australia has inherited, with local adaptation, a legal and political system with English roots. The legacy of English common law and institutions, and their grafting onto an Australian context, is well described.10 The Australian legal framework and conventions around the preparation, structure, format and passage of legislation have changed markedly from the first laws of the penal colony of New South Wales under the provenance of the British Parliament through to today. These legal origins include the New South Wales Courts Act 1787, which established the first Australian criminal court in New South Wales.11 The importation of legal conventions from England did not acknowledge the laws operating within Indigenous and Torres Strait Islander communities at the time of colonisation, nor for a considerable time beyond.

Australian legal history can aid an explanation of how laws are made and applied, but it is not sufficiently nuanced to describe how Australian higher education has been created and financed. What is lacking from the archive is a specific typology for categorising various forms of higher education legislation, various forms of financing legislation, and categorising changes to this legislation across time. Existing legal classification frameworks do not provide guidance on how to classify higher education legislation, or any specific features of the Australian higher education landscape. Some bespoke categorisation is required within this research to adequately identify Australian higher education financing legislation.

One of the few references that describes universities and the law is Law for educators: School and university law in Australia.12 Whilst this describes some legislation that supports the

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funding of higher education, there is little reference to the specifics of this legislation, nor how it has changed. Law for educators aims to describe the legal issues that universities and other public education institutions might confront, so it is not surprising that it does not delve into the historic forces that have shaped Australian higher education legislation. That signals the absence of an agreed typology in which to categorise Australian higher education legislation.

For several years, the Grattan Institute published Mapping Australian higher education.13 This provides an overview of information and data about the sector, including its financing, the legislative basis for Commonwealth power and authority, and key developments in this history and evolution of the sector. Andrew Norton, author of these mapping reports, remains one of the few people in Australia with a fulsome grasp of the intricacies of policy and funding, and he maintains a prolific output of commentary on matters relating to higher education.14 The mapping reports are designed to provide system newcomers with a high-level overview that cuts through a bewildering range of statistics and policy detail. They deliver insights for both novice and more experienced system stakeholders, but underlying complexity remains.

The extent of regulatory complexity has been explored in formal reviews of higher education regulation15 and reporting.16 The reporting review cites the University of Sydney’s compliance framework and the 102 Acts and regulations with which it must comply.17 By contrast, the Legal Risk and Compliance Framework, at the University of Adelaide, describes over 220 Acts.18 Universities of Sydney and Adelaide demonstrate there is no agreed paradigm that defines legislation applicable to universities. There is a continuum of relevance for higher education legislation. Some will be highly deterministic and targeted towards specific system operations and outcomes. Others are more general requirements applying to all entities. Even requirements applying to a single researcher undertaking studies into a particularly narrow field of endeavour must be understood and complied with if the university is to operate within the law.19 On this basis, a wide range of legislation has relevance to the operations and financing of universities. Tracing the heredity of some 220 Acts would be problematic for a study of this type. There is a need to contain the scope of legislation under review to that more closely aligned with “Australian higher education financing legislation”.

Legislation relevant to the contemporary higher education financing context can be filtered readily. University and public accounts allow one to observe the proportion of revenue linked to public subsidies distributed via the authority of specific legislation. The Australian Research Council Act 2001 Cth facilitated the distribution of over $700 million in research grants to universities in 2016.20 The National Health and Medical Research Council Act (1992) Cth facilitated distribution of over $600 million in grants to universities.21 Various taxation legislation underpins Australia’s income-contingent loan policy, with the combined accumulation of loan debt standing at $54 billion in 2015/16.22 The Education Services for Overseas Students Act 2000 Cth (ESOS) enables Australia’s international education industry, generating over $6 billion in student fees for Australian universities in 2016.23 Vast sums of money are mediated by these Acts, and all contribute to the dynamic and complex system observable today. The most significant piece of financing legislation in Australia is the Higher Education Support Act 2003 (Cth) (HESA). In 2017/18, HESA was associated with over $11 billion in Commonwealth outlays for Australian higher education,24 around one-third of the system’s entire financing. HESA supports a range of programs, including the Commonwealth Grant Scheme, Higher Education Superannuation Program, Higher Education Support, the

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Higher Education Loan Program, Investment in Higher Education Research, and Research Capacity.

The billions of dollars in public appropriations made possible by these Acts, and highly regulated constraints around how private money might be expended on higher education, represent a small but significant subset of the hundreds of items of legislation that intersect with Australian higher education. None of these Acts operate in isolation. HESA, for example, forms the backbone of an income-contingent loan scheme. As such, HESA is entwined with legislation relating to taxation and labour markets. HESA specifically names universities eligible for certain categories of funding, and with each university backed by specific (usually) state-based legislation, there is an interplay between university Acts and HESA. ESOS provides the legislative backing for Australia’s international education industry and interacts with other legislation relating to immigration and border controls. Even where a single Act mediates a significant proportion of an institution’s, or the broader system’s, financing, it cannot be isolated from the broader policy context. This might explain why legislation has not featured prominently in the literature. Everything is entwined and interrelated. Cherry-picking discrete elements of legislation ignores the bigger legislative ecosystem.

The complexity of legislation influencing higher education today, and the general absence of literature that critically analyses higher education legislation, introduces significant conceptual and methodological challenges. Taking too narrow a scope might ignore important interdependencies. Taking too broad a frame of reference will lead to overwhelming complexity. Following the path of a research tradition that emphasises the broader social and cultural factors that shape the system whilst ignoring the legislative detail would perpetuate a significant gap in our knowledge. Some compromise must be reached across these competing tensions to carve a new and credible path.

The compromise reached to cut through the 220+ items of legislation currently influencing Australian universities is an explicit focus on financing legislation. This is defined as legislation that has a direct and explicit reference to funding of the higher education system or higher education institutions. Using this definition, HESA is within scope, while broader legislation, such as that relating to taxation, is not. Narrower legislation, such as that concerned with specific forms of research endeavour, is only within scope if there is an explicit reference to higher education financing.

Understanding HESA, across 500+ pages of detail, is challenging reading, but not beyond the capacity of an informed and committed reader. The larger challenge for the purposes of this study is to better understand whether legislation like HESA will serve as a form of path dependency that locks the system into its form and substance long into the future. Relevant to the research questions is whether the heredity of higher education is encoded within HESA and other financing legislation. To answer this, it is important to understand the origins of HESA and other relevant legislation.

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THE EVOLUTION OF AUSTRALIAN HIGHER EDUCATION LEGISLATION

The legislative environment in which Australian higher education operates is a dynamic, interdependent entanglement of Acts. These Acts are not immutable, amended at varying degrees of frequency across time. HESA, for example, has been amended 69 times between 2003, when first enacted, and 2019. An average of over 4.3 times per year (Table 1). This rate of amendment does not include unsuccessful attempts to legislate change, which represents an additional level of policy activity. Amendments to HESA are distinctive and exceed the rate of legislative change evident for other parts of the higher education system, other socially important areas of public funding and international higher education benchmarks.

Table 1. Select Australian Higher Education Legislation Amendment Count

Commonwealth Higher Education Legislation25 Amendments to

2019 Amendments

Per Year

Higher Education Support Act 2003 69 4.3

Tertiary Education Quality and Standards Agency Act 2011 13 1.6

Education Services of Overseas Students Act 2000 29 1.5

Australian Research Council Act 2001 19 1.1

Australian National University Act 1991 17 0.6

National Health and Medical Research Council Act 1992 15 0.6

Commonwealth Non-Higher Education Legislation

Australian Broadcasting Corporation Act 1983 34 1.0

Australian Education Act 2013 5 0.8

Human Services (Medicare) Act 1973 59 1.3

Overseas Legislation

England – Higher Education Act26 2004 24 1.6

New Zealand – Education Act27 1989 99 3.3

The choice of England as a comparator for rates of higher education financing legislation change is motivated by Watson’s claim that “…Internationally, only the Australians are in our league” for being “the most politically tinkered system in the world”.28 If HESA is indicative of political tinkering, a rate of amendment that is twice that of the English equivalent brings the validity of Watson’s claim into question. Perhaps Australia is in a league of its own. Across the ditch in New Zealand, the Education Act is amended at a high rate, but given it spans all forms of education from early childhood to universities, this again suggests HESA’s rate of amendment is internationally distinctive.

This rate of amendment raises questions about the fundamental qualities of Australian higher education, associated financing legislation and its evolution across time. One can hypothesise as to causal explanations of this level of amendment, but there is limited literature that specifically considers Australian financing legislation over the life of HESA or longer term. Davis

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includes commentary around the role of legislatures and legislation in the establishment of Australian universities and subsequent maturation of the system.29 Davis cites numerous points at which legislation has changed and the substance of these changes, but this is primarily in service of defining the Australian university, not patterns of legislative change.

The absence of a widely accepted taxonomy of higher education legislation and its amendments means we have little to guide us on the nature of the changes evident in HESA. The 69 amendments referenced in Table 1 may involve minor technical amendments of little substance or impact. No studies have been identified that trace and track higher education financing across time to understand patterns of what might be categorised as inconsequential or transformative legislative amendment. Keyword searches for variants of “higher education”, “legislation” and “change” in various databases have not produced results that would quantify or explain the extent of higher education legislative change that has been passed. There was no literature identified that provides a description of why Australian higher education financing legislation changes with the frequency that it does.

There is literature that explores higher education that has indirect relevance to the rate of legislative amendment. The Commonwealth Department of Education and Training meta-analysis – A review of reviews – explores key themes emerging from various reviews of Australian higher education since the Dawkins reforms of the late-1980s.30 The reviews cited may, if acted upon by governments, contribute to a causal chain of events that represents, in sequence, a catalyst for a change in policy, that then requires some form of legislative amendment to be developed, and that is then shepherded through parliamentary processes. This describes the process of policy reform but does not explain why change is required so frequently, and whether Australia can anticipate a similar rate of policy reform in future.

Legislation can be understood as a specific and detailed policy artefact of public policy process and higher education system. Paying close attention to legislation and the text contained within could detract from an appreciation of the broader and perhaps more important public policy and higher education ecosystem processes that shape higher education. In the time since HESA was enacted, there have been eight prime ministers and much change in higher education policy. “Full-fee undergraduate places education” was for a time encouraged and then forbidden. Student places were deliberately allocated by the Commonwealth to institutions for a time, then replaced by the free for all of demand-driven funding, itself replaced by maximum grant amounts. Changes to HESA reflect the policy preferences of what has proven to be a dynamic policy context. One can rightly ask whether this outcome represents “good higher education policy”, even if such a thing could be agreed upon. The peak body of Australian universities suggests that:

The resources for both teaching and research should be sufficient, sustainable and predictable to enable universities to deliver on the expectations of students, employers, the community and governments.31

Predictable resourcing appears elusive if HESA is changing so much. A major study of higher education by an independent outsider concluded that there was a:

lack of development of stable and informed government public policy for education, particularly higher education.32

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Recent assessments of Australian higher education open questions of whether there has ever been stable and informed policy leading to sufficient and sustainable resourcing. Bowen’s Law, or the Revenue Theory of Costs,33 suggests that there will always be constraints around the extent to which governments can meet university aspirations. University expenditure is constrained by its revenue, or, in more pointed terms, a former deputy vice-chancellor cites Bowen’s Law to describe the business model of universities: “Institutions raise as much money as they can get and they spend it all.”34

University missions are complex, and there is always more to do than can be done, particularly in the domain of research. The ever-increasing boundary of knowledge imposes higher costs to fulfil research functions. Whether it is the time required to produce groundbreaking work in philosophy, the physical infrastructure of the Synchrotron, gravity wave detectors, automated PCR machines, or the skilled staff required to utilise these facilities, higher education research does not come cheap.

The system and its appetite for resources was not always so complex. In 1849 there was no higher education legislation and no university operating within what we now know as Australia. In a process that is not fully understood, we have gone from zero to hundreds of items of legislation that influence and shape Australian higher education. We have evolved from zero pages of legislation to a specific Act of parliament, HESA, that runs into hundreds of pages, and which shapes the distribution of billions of dollars for higher education purposes. This Act leads the world for the rate at which it is tinkered with and amended. The archive of higher education legislation highlights that world-class tinkering is not just a feature of HESA. There is a pattern that stretches back in time, both in the frequency with which the Commonwealth passed financing legislation pre-HESA (Figure 1), and the frequency with which states passed financing legislation pre-Commonwealth involvement (Figure 2).

Figure 1. Commonwealth Financing Legislation, 1920 to 1988

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Figure 2. State and Territory Financing Legislation, 1850 to 1950

Financing legislation depicted in Figures 1 and 2 includes that with a direct and explicit reference to the distribution of public funds, or right to access private funds, and any subsequent amendments to this legislation. Commonwealth financing legislation is evident from 1920, but it is not until the States Grants (Universities) Act 1951 that there is a coherent Commonwealth focus on higher education, which provides a platform for an increasing number of variants of States Grants Acts and amending legislation spanning 1960 to 1988. State financing legislation includes university establishment legislation (which in most cases embedded a fixed endowment), legislation that specifically directed funds for university purposes (land acquisition, buildings, scholarships and research) and broader legislation that included specific appropriations for university purposes (such as Supply and Appropriation Acts).

It is worth diverting the gaze from crude counts of individual items of legislation to the context in which this legislative activity is situated. Since World War II, Australian higher education has gone through a dramatic expansion in participation.35 Around the time at which Commonwealth legislation was passed at a faster rate, higher education participation was examined by the Committee on the Future of Tertiary Education in Australia36 (chaired by L. H. Martin in 1964). The proportion of an age cohort now leaving school and immediately progressing to university is now over 40%. In 1964, progression to higher education was for the chosen few, and even school completion was an achievement: only 15% of the age cohort finished secondary school; only one boy in six (17%) and one girl in 14 (7%) of the age cohort would be expected to progress to university by the age of 30.37

Whether one considers the contemporary legislative reform process for a massified system under Commonwealth control, or the historical legislative reform processes deployed by the Commonwealth or the states, there is a level of legislative activity that is not well explained by

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the literature. Consideration is next given to the conventional narratives about the evolution of Australian higher education, and engagement or otherwise with these legislative developments.

CONVENTIONAL EXPLANATORY ACCOUNTS AND NARRATIVES

The previous section worked back from the current day to the origins of the system. This section briefly considers conventional accounts and narratives in the reverse direction. The origins of Australian higher education are often given cursory attention in the literature. Marginson and Considine use the term “pre-history” to describe the origins of the “enterprise university”.38 This pre-history begins with the Martin report in 1964, all but ignoring preceding legislative developments. Gallagher uses the term “pre-1945” rather than pre-history to frame analysis of contemporary policy debates almost entirely from 1945 onwards. A century of higher education before the war is distilled into a single paragraph.39

The conventional account that Australian higher education policy is defined by the post-war period is exemplified by the National report on Australia’s higher education sector40. The report sketched the antecedents of the Australian higher education system to provide an authoritative reference point for Australian higher education at a time of significant reform. The report sought to be a benchmark for future research and analysis, given the transition from the binary system to the unified national system. This aspiration has been achieved, with citations in policy documents,41 parliamentary briefings,42 policy advocacy,43 policy consultation,44 and research and policy analysis.45

The National report on Australia’s higher education sector provides a dismissive and critical account of universities up to World War II. The report’s sentiment is exemplified by inclusion of an extract of one journalist’s account of Australian universities in the early 1880s:

… universities … remained small institutions remote from the concerns and the interest of the vast majority of the population until well after the Second World War.46

The report includes affirmation of practices in throughout the establishment of Australian higher education, singling out the rise of scientific disciplines in the late 19th century. There is, however, little in the report that describes how the system was financed across its first century, nor which might provide insight into any state-based differences. The basis and process by which Australian higher education has been financed should not be ignored. Even within the first decade of Australian higher education there are cues as to different forms of legislation and the policy processes that produce and amend legislation. These differences and similarities can be juxtaposed with current funding arrangements, where a sample size of one (Commonwealth Parliament) makes it difficult to do anything other than provide a blow-by-blow account of a single timeline of events. Figure 2 highlighted over 300 items of financing legislation enacted in the first century of Australian higher education. There is limited literature that explores patterns of higher education policymaking, and legislation across this period, and whether it might inform an understanding of legislative activity in the current day.

Glyn Davis is distinctive in the literature for a more comprehensive analysis of developments in higher education that extend from the point of origin, straddling both sides of World War II, to contemporary developments. This includes analysis of the Republic of learning through the

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Boyer Lectures,47 and the book The Australian idea of a university.48 In a related earlier article, Davis suggests that the University of Sydney:

… would become the model for all later Australian higher education—an autonomous, professional, comprehensive, secular, public and commuter university.49

Convergence on a single model of higher education is consistent with the “one university, 220 campuses” critique referenced earlier, and other work bemoaning the lack of diversity in Australian institutions.50 However, the legislative basis for this convergence across the history of Australian higher education is not comprehensively examined or described. The homogenising power of the Dawkins reforms is well represented in the literature.51 The impact of the Martin report and introduction of the binary system is also well described.52 Convergence towards the “enterprise university” is explored in terms of university governance.53 In each of these examples, legislative design, interpretation and implementation receive little attention.54

An additional framing of literature relating to Australian higher education financing is sources and categories of financing. The National report on Australia’s higher education sector generated at the time of the Dawkins reforms provided a reference point for the shifting contributions of state, Commonwealth and student revenue sources.55 The shifting dynamics of which have a legislative basis that has not been fully examined. A more comprehensive analysis of financing options can be found in international and, particularly, United States of America literature.56

Another key framing in literature examining Australian higher education financing is that of the “change agents” associated with specific periods of higher education, and the reviews that catalysed the transition across eras. Leslie Harold Martin was one of many involved in one review process, but it is his name that is synonymous with the Martin reforms and establishment of the binary system. The transition from binary to unified system is understood by most as the Dawkins reforms, named after the Minister of Education of the time. The more recent temporary transition from regulated place allocation to demand-driven funding is synonymous with Denise Bradley, who, like Martin before, chaired a review of higher education, now colloquially known as the Bradley review.57 This focus on review chairs and change agents is consistent with a broad focus in the literature to understand the social and cultural factors associated with change, and the underlying policy intent to achieve particular policy outcomes. There is, however, limited literature that considers how these reviews and the policy intent is codified in legislation, and how this legislation might evolve across time. These change agents and policy consultation processes highlight an additional challenge associated with higher education financing legislation: the growth industry of people employed to understand and who seek to influence the composition of higher education legislation.

HIGHER EDUCATION POLICY ADVICE – A GROWING CONCERN

One might question whether the absence of literature around legislation is of meaningful significance to higher education scholarship or the effective operations of the higher education system. On a personal level, the level of legislative activity has been of significant benefit. Higher education increasingly employs people who have the capacity to understand the workings and mechanics of the system, and who provide constructive advice on how the

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system can be fine-tuned and enhanced. Whilst not a perfect measure, the Census of Population and Housing collects data on the numbers of people whose occupation is “Intelligence and Policy Analysts”,58 whose responsibilities are defined as:

Develops and analyses policies guiding the design, implementation and modification of government or commercial operations and programs.59

The number of staff in this categorisation working in higher education more than doubled from 2006 to 2016, and the proportion of higher education workers in this category has increased by 50%.60 Some of this increase might be attributed to the rise of institutional networks, such as Innovative Research Universities, Regional Universities Network and the Group of Eight. Some of the increase might be attributed to institutional roles, which in my case have included job titles of “strategic adviser equity policy” and “senior manager higher education policy”. Good, high-paying work if you can get it, and symptomatic of the growing need to both understand and influence higher education policy.

There is cost associated with current policy design, its rate of refinement, and associated advocacy for particular policy outcomes. This spans the cost of reporting,61 and the direct and opportunity costs of parliamentary time spent on regular updates to HESA and other higher education legislation. There are other pressing economic, social and environmental issues that require attention. This pattern of higher education policy activity has spurned a burst of higher education research reports and advocacy papers that are to be read, processed and that warrant a policy analyst’s response. The Mitchell Institute, the Grattan Institute, the National Centre for Student Equity in Higher Education, KPMG, Deloitte, EY and PwC, and many more, interrogate patterns and trends in pursuit of a different future. Few, if any, reports point to the rate of legislative change as internationally distinctive. Some publications put forward alternative policy and financing arrangements, such as independent coordinating bodies.62 This may have the effect of bringing Australia back to the rest of the pack for legislative activity, but it is predicated on values of institutional diversity rather than costs of the current legislative approach and rate of legislative change. This returns us to the start of the chapter and the deep path of convergence towards a particular form of higher education. This path is enabled and perpetuated by what appears to be a uniquely Australian approach to high-frequency tinkering with financing legislation.

FULL CIRCLE: GLYN DAVIS AND THE POLICY CYCLE

This chapter opened with a quote from Professor Glyn Davis, drawn from a text published in his final year as Vice-Chancellor of the University of Melbourne. The Australian idea of a university embodies accumulated wisdom of four decades of experience associated with higher education, spanning student, academic and leadership roles. This text is one of the few that exists that interrogates higher education policy across the entirety of its history, and which explores a credible and plausible future. Concepts consistent with “heredity” of Australian higher education are to be found in this and other work he has published, even if semantic preferences are different.

Davis is also synonymous with public policy; his career includes academic positions in public policy and leadership roles within government. Davis writes not as a botanist and leader draping analysis with biological metaphor (as Ashby did), but as a policy theorist and leader analysing higher education policy. The combination of theory and practice is evident in The

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Australian policy handbook,63 an introductory guide to policymaking for scholars and practitioners alike. The handbook is structured around an idealised policy cycle: identifying issues, policy analysis, policy instruments, consultation, coordination, decision, implementation and evaluation. In this framing, legislation is just one of many potential policy instruments that can be used in response to a specific policy issue, and which may form part of the implementation of a policy once a political decision has been made. Legislation is a sub-component of this larger policy system, itself nested within a broader social context.

The policy cycle that Davis describes represents a maturation of public policy theory and practice event at the end of the twentieth century. This dissertation utilises this contemporary understanding retrospectively, acknowledging that policy making of the past may have features consistent with the policy cycle, even though no such deliberate theorisation was evident at the time. References to public policy processes and policy cycles throughout the dissertation should be understood as shorthand retrospective application of these ideas, rather than implied deliberate approach adopted consistently across time.

Adopting this logic, The Australian idea of a university can be understood as a multitude of policy cycles that have brought Australian higher education to its current point, and which include deeply embedded features evident in the policy choices made with the establishment of the University of Sydney. Australia has converged on the ideal type of a university. Notwithstanding institutional variations of sandstone, red brick, gum tree and unitechs – Australian universities have tended to “isomorphism”, emulating each other and strongly influenced by foundational elite institutions.64 The deep path, or convergence of potentially infinite options into a single dominant form, is of significant scholarly interest. Orchestrating hundreds of items of legislation that shape and influence higher education today into a coherent whole would be an admirable outcome if arising from deliberate coordinated manipulation of multijurisdictional policy cycles. This dissertation seeks to understand whether there is a deeper structural process in play. One in which a structural “heredity” process influences how various policy cycles operate, mediating the relationship between higher education and broader society.

Many scholars are involved in work that seeks to understand how Australian higher education has emerged, and where it might be heading. Common themes include how notions of equity and fairness might permeate policy across time, and what might explain persistent underrepresentation.65 The role of neoliberalism in pushing policy cycles towards more individualistic market focused approaches is also well populated.66 The maintained separation of vocational and higher education, despite advocacy for a more coordinated approach, is also well described.67 How the shift to managerialism has been achieved, and how this might affect higher education is another common trope.68 As stated earlier, there is no shortage of normative analysis in higher education literature. What is under-examined, however, is the role that legislation plays in the broader higher education policy cycle, both as a manifestation of the social processes that give rise to legislation, and as a factor in influencing the responses of society to higher education. Davis highlights the deep path embedded in a multitude of policy cycles. Few have explored the legislative artefacts of the policy cycle as an object of analysis in its own right. This dissertation undertakes a more detailed exploration of this domain. A better understanding of why Australia is in a league of its own for legislative change might help set a new course towards the destination of stable and informed government public policy for higher education.

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1 Glyn Davis, The Australian idea of a university (Melbourne University Publishing 2017), 28.

2 Raewyn Connell, “Southern theory and world universities,” Higher Education Research & Development, 36, no. 1 (2017): 4–15.

3 Davis, The Australian idea of a university, 128.

4 Ibid, 104.

5 Raewyn Connell, The good university: What universities actually do and why it’s time for radical change (Zed Books Ltd., 2019), 19.

6 Australian New Zealand Standard Research Classification (ANZSRC), 2008.

7 A keyword search on 22 October 2020 for for the phrase “Australian higher education financing legislation” in Google returned results exclusively related to the website for doctoral students of the Melbourne Centre for the Study of Higher Education, Graduate researchers, https://melbourne-cshe.unimelb.edu.au/about/graduate-researchers.

8 Australian Government, Regulation Impact Statement, 2014–15 Budget Higher Education Reforms. (Australian Government, 2014), 49. Document created 1 October 2014, https://ris.pmc.gov.au/2014/10/01/higher-education-reforms-–-regulation-impact-statement-–-department-education.

9 Michael Polanyi, The tacit dimension (University of Chicago Press, 2009).

10 Russell Hinchy, The Australian legal system: History, institutions and method (Thomson Reuters, 2015).

11 Museum of Australian Democracy, Rule of law, Retrieved 1 June 2020, from https://explore-origin.moadoph.gov.au/timelines/rule-of-law#milestone=first-criminal-court.

12 James G Jackson and Sally Varnham, Law for educators: School and university law in Australia (LexisNexis Butterworths, Chatswood, NSW. 2007).

13 Andrew Norton, Ittima Cherastidtham, and Will Mackey, Mapping Australian higher education 2018. (Grattan Institute, 2018).

14 Andrew Norton’s commentary blog is updated regularly and augments his formal publications on higher education: Andrew Norton, Andrew Norton: Higher Education Commentary from Carlton, https://andrewnorton.net.au.

15 These forces are represented diagrammatically in: Kwong Lee Dow and Valerie Braithwaite, Review of higher education regulation report (Commonwealth of Australia, 2013), 19 and 21.

16 Phillips KPA, Review of reporting requirements for universities final report (Melbourne: LH Martin Institute, 2012).

17 Ibid, 27.

18 University of Adelaide, Legal compliance framework, published 20 January 2010, https://www.adelaide.edu.au/policies/925/all/?dsn=policy.version;field=data;id=14883;m=view.;

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University of Adelaide, Legal compliance framework, published 15 December 2017, https://www.adelaide.edu.au/policies/925/?dsn=policy.document;field=data;id=1404;m=view.

19 For example, the Genetically Modified Crops Management Act 2004 (SA) is unlikely to be front and centre of thinking about higher education across an institution, but for those involved in relevant research, demonstrated compliance with this Act will be critical to securing research funding.

20 Department of Education and Training, Finance 2016: Financial Reports of Higher Education Providers. Published 24 January 2018, https://docs.education.gov.au/node/47911.

21 National Health and Medical Research Council, Research funding statistics and data, retrieved 4 May 2020, https://www.nhmrc.gov.au/funding/data-research/research-funding-statistics-and-data.

22 Australian Taxation Office, Taxation Statistics 2015–16 Snapshot – Table 5. Australian Taxation Office. Retrieved 8 December 2018. https://data.gov.au/dataset/taxation-statistics-2015-16/.

23 Department of Education and Training, Finance 2016: Financial Reports of Higher Education Providers.

24 Department of Education and Training, Portfolio budget statements 2018–19 (Department of Education and Training, 2018) published 8 May 2018, https://docs.education.gov.au/node/50566.

25 Australian Government, Federal Register of Legislation, retrieved 1 October 2020, www.legislation.gov.au.

26The National Archives, www.Legislation.gov.uk, retrieved 1 October 2020, www.legislation.gov.uk.

27 New Zealand Parliamentary Counsel Office, New Zealand Legislation, retrieved 1 October 2020, www.legislation.govt.nz.

28 David Watson, “The coming of post-institutional higher education,” Oxford Review of Education, 41, no. 5 (2015): 549–562.

29 Glyn Davis, “The Australian idea of a university” Meanjin, 72, no. 3 (2013): 32.

30 Department of Education and Training, Higher education in Australia: A review of reviews from Dawkins to today (Department of Education and Training, 2015), published 28 October 2015, https://docs.education.gov.au/documents/higher-education-australia.

31 Universities Australia, Keep it clever: Policy statement (Universities Australia, Canberra, 2016), retrieved 1 October 2020, https://www.universitiesaustralia.edu.au/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/Keep-it-Clever-Policy-Statement-2016.pdf.

32 William. B. Lacy, et al., Australian universities at a crossroads: Insights from their leaders and implications for the future. (Centre for the Study of Higher Education. University of Melbourne & Centre for Studies in Higher Education. University of California Berkeley, 2017), 4.

33 William. F. Massy, “Cost and pricing in higher education,” Handbook of Research and Educational Finance and Policy, Ed Edward Fiske and Helen Ladd (Routledge New York 2012), 693–709.

34 Lawrence Cram, The expenditure on research and education outputs by Australian universities 1996–2009 (Submission, Base Funding Review 2011).

35 See Don Anderson, “Access to university education in Australia 1852–1990: Changes in the undergraduate social mix,” Higher Education Review, 24, no. 2 (1992): 8.; and, Mark Warburton, Resourcing Australia’s tertiary education sector (LH Martin Institute, University of Melbourne, 2016).

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36 Committee on the Future of Tertiary Education in Australia, Tertiary education in Australia, (Committee on the Future of Tertiary Education in Australia, Canberra, ACT: Australian Government Publishing Service, 1964).

37 Ibid, 11.

38 Simon Marginson and Mark Considine, The enterprise university: Power, governance and reinvention in Australia (Cambridge University Press, 2000), 23.

39 Mike Gallagher, A Memory of Elephants on the Modern Campus: Indicative Assumptions Underlying Higher Education Policy in Australia 1945-1985-2015: Academic, Statist and Market Perspectives (LH Martin Institute. University of Melbourne, 2016), 5.

40 Department of Employment Education and Training, National report on Australia’s higher education sector (Australian Government Publishing Service, Canberra, 1993).

41 Brendon Nelson, Higher education at the crossroads: an overview paper (Department of Employment Science and Training, Commonwealth of Australia, Canberra. 2002).

42 Kim Jackson, Australian higher education funding policy. E Brief. (Australian Parliamentary Library, 2003), published December 2000, https://www.aph.gov.au/About_Parliament/Parliamentary_Departments/Parliamentary_Library/Publications_Archive/archive/hefunding

43 Group of Eight, Go8 Backgrounder 14. Higher Education Financing (Group of Eight 2010), published November 2010, https://go8.edu.au/files/docs/publications/go8backgrounder14_finance.pdf

44 Jane Lomax-Smith, Louise Watson, and Beth Webster, Higher education base funding review, final report (Department of Education, Employment and Workplace Relations, Canberra, 2011).

45 Geoff Sharrock, Decoding Abbott’s plans for universities. The Conversation. Retrieved 1 August 2017, http://theconversation.com/decoding-tony-abbotts-plans-for-universities-12540; Andrew Norton, and Ittima Cherastidtham, Mapping Australian higher education, 2014–15, (Grattan Institute, 2014).

46 Department of Employment Education and Training, National report on Australia’s higher education sector, 1.

47 Glyn Davis, Boyer Lectures 2010: The republic of learning (Australian Broadcasting Corporation, 2010), published 14 November 2010, https://www.abc.net.au/radionational/programs/boyerlectures/series/boyer-lectures-2010-the-republic-of-learning/2981312

48 Davis, The Australian idea of a university.

49 Davis, “The Australian idea of a university”, Meanjin.

50 Hamish Coates, et al., Profiling diversity of Australian universities (Australian Council for Educational Research 2013).

51 Stuart Macintyre, Andre Brett, and Gwilym Croucher, No end of a lesson: Australia’s unified national system of higher education (Melbourne University Publishing 2017).

52 Susan. L. Davies, The Martin Committee and the binary policy of higher education in Australia (Ashwood House 1989).

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53 Marginson and Considine, The enterprise university: Power, governance and reinvention in Australia

54 Macintyre, Brett and Croucher devote less than 100 words to the passage of the Higher Education Funding Act in their comprehensive historical assessment of the Dawkins reforms. There is “no end of a lesson” that can be learnt about higher education from the Dawkins reforms, but the specific details of how these reforms were legislated attracts only passing mention: Macintyre, Brett and Croucher, No end of a lesson: Australia’s unified national system of higher education, 77.

55 Department of Employment Education and Training, National report on Australia’s higher education sector

56 Daniel. T. Layzell, “State higher education funding models: An assessment of current and emerging approaches,” Journal of Education Finance, 33, no. 1 (2007): 1–19.

57 Denise Bradley, et al., Review of Australian higher education: Final report (Australian Government Department of Education, Employment and Workplace Relations, Canberra 2008).

58 Australian Bureau of Statistics, Census Dictionary, Published 23 August 2016, https://www.abs.gov.au/ausstats/abs@.nsf/Lookup/2901.0Chapter7602016, Occupation Code 2244, Intelligence and Policy Analysts.

59 Australian Bureau of Statistics, ANZSCO – Australian and New Zealand Standard Classification of Occupations, published 25 June 2009, https://www.abs.gov.au/AUSSTATS/abs@.nsf/DetailsPage/1220.0First%20Edition,%20Revision%201?OpenDocument

60 Australian Bureau of Statistics, Census of Population and Housing, Table Builder, 2006 and 2016. Persons working full time or part time in higher education in occupation code 2244.

61 Phillips KPA, Review of reporting requirements for universities final report

62 Leo Goedegebuure, et al., “A framework for differentiation,” Visions for Australian tertiary education, eds, Richard James, Sarah French and Paula Kelly (Melbourne Centre for the Study of Higher Education, University of Melbourne, 2017), 7-16.

63 The first edition was penned by Bridgman and Davis: Peter Bridgman and Glyn Davis, The Australian Policy Handbook (Allen and Ulwin, 1998), subsequent updates have involved other contributors. The most recent edition: Catherine Althaus, Peter Bridgman, and Glyn Davis, The Australian Policy Handbook: A practical guide to the policy making process (Allen and Ulwin, 2017), is promoted as a classic introduction to the process of policy development in government.

64 Marginson and Considine, The enterprise university: Power, governance and reinvention in Australia.

65 Andrew Harvey, Catherine Burnheim, and Matthew Brett, eds, Student equity in Australian higher education: Twenty-five years of a fair chance for all (Springer, 2016).

66 Dorothy Bottrell and Catherine Manathunga, eds, Resisting neoliberalism in higher education volume I: Seeing through the cracks (Springer, 2018).

67 Gwilym Croucher, Jonathan Chew and Peter Noonan, “Funding an expanded tertiary system: Designing a coherent financing architecture,” Visions for Australian tertiary education, eds, Richard James, Sarah French and Paula Kelly (Melbourne Centre for the Study of Higher Education, University of Melbourne, 2017), 17-26.

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68 David Pick, Stephen Teo, and Melissa Yeung, “Friend or foe? New managerialism and technical, administrative and clerical support staff in Australian universities,” Higher Education Quarterly, 66, no. 1 (2012): 3–23.

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CHAPTER THREE: THEORISING HIGHER EDUCATION AND PUBLIC POLICY

In every advanced society the problems of higher education are problems associated with growth. Growth poses a variety of problems for the educational systems that experience it and for the societies that support them. These problems arise in every part of higher education – in its finance; in its government and administration; …

Martin Trow (1973) Problems in the transition from elite to mass higher education.1

The institutional form of the university has European medieval origins in Europe,2 but in the 20th century it was America that emerged as the definitive reference point for widening participation to a high-quality higher education. American scholars of higher education, by virtue of the distinctive standing of American higher education, generated critical insights into global understandings of higher education policy, and policy change. This chapter draws upon American scholarship of higher education to contextualise key developments in Australian higher education policy and legislation. This serves as a conceptual lens through which to understand higher education dimensions of the heredity of Australian higher education and refine the scope of analysis. This chapter also explores public policy literature, again with a focus on scholarship emanating from the United States. Together, a theorisation of higher education and public policy provides the basis of a conceptual model of heredity that can be applied to better understand Australian higher education financing legislation, filling knowledge gaps outlined in Chapter Two.

HIGHER EDUCATION Martin Trow: Elite, Mass and Universal Participation

Martin Trow’s seminal work Problems in the transition from elite to mass higher education3 describes the drivers of, and the associated challenges of, growth in participation in higher education systems. This work was informed by the increasing scale of American higher education activity and participation. This was distinctive for a time, but in once-lauded exemplars like California, the dream is well and truly over.4 There is now a large number of high-participation higher education systems across the world, and many with higher rates of participation and attainment than America.5 Trow’s depiction of the social and economic factors driving growth in higher education systems through phases of elite, mass and universal participation is fully integrated within higher education systems’ design and discourse. Trow’s framing of expansion has defined the way in which higher education has been discussed in Australia across decades.6

Maintaining funding for higher education at per-student rates of expenditure as it expands from one in 10 participating (i.e. Australia at the start of the binary system7) to one in two (i.e. Australia today8) imposes significant challenges. Higher education competes for resources with other universities who must accommodate greater student diversity in demography and preparedness. It also creates policy tensions as funding for higher education competes with other forms of public and private expenditure.9 If one were able to step back in time to 1973 and the publication of Trow’s work, and then match developments in Australian higher education through to today, there is an uncanny prescience that parallels actual events. Trow’s work can be understood as a component of the heredity of Australian higher education – the

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ideas and frameworks that explain complex social processes and which can take on a life of their own. The future is foretold, but also influenced, as policy actors appropriate these ideas to explain or advocate for what must happen next. In exploring the heredity of higher education through legislation, Trow provides a lens through which to view and interpret the underlying logic of legislation and its amendment. This includes references to social and economic influences as an adaptive pressure catalysing system expansion.

Trow highlighted the need for legislative adaptation to facilitate expansion, but offered little on how this response is catalysed, mediated or enacted. More recently, Marginson builds on Trow’s work to identify additional policy drivers that explain expansion in scale, augmenting social demand with economic pull factor explanations, and a more nuanced list of causes including political choice, credentialism and global systems.10 No matter which constellation of factors has enabled the expansion of Australian higher education, their effect is mediated at least in part through legislation. From the origins of Australian higher education through to the current day, there has been a strong public orientation backed by significant public financing and regulation. Australia is not alone in this regard, but to understand how Australia compares with other systems, it is useful to turn to another American scholar of higher education, Burton Clark.

Burton Clark: The Triangle of Coordination

Burton Clark’s The higher education system: Academic organization in cross-national perspective11 examined how academic disciplinary groupings combine and are organised in a sustainable form within institutions and higher education systems. This is grounded in an “internalist perspective”12 and a bottom-up coherent account of how knowledge-related functions of academic work are organised by different higher education systems. Institutional structures are posited by Clark as critical for cultivating an effective system for organising research, teaching and learning activity. Institutional structures mitigate the propensity for academics to march to the beat of their own drum, exploring their interests in ways that have limited relevance to anyone but themselves. These structures are the essence of a sustainable organisational form. These structures operate at a system level, ensuring a feedback loop between scholar, department, institution, society and state. There is no universal rule that connects the scholar to the institution, society and state; different forms and characteristics are evident across the world. System and national preferences operate within what Clark described as a triangle of coordination, with the relative strength of “academic oligarchy”, “state authority” and “market demand” influencing how different systems are managed and coordinated.

Clark’s triangle of coordination is a widely cited framework for comparative analysis of national systems of higher education. Various scholars have put Clark’s “iron triangle” to the anvil for remoulding. Some use softer language in describing its vertices; for example, replacing “academic oligarchy” with “professional/collegial”.13 Others place an additional triangle at each point, recommending a “microcosmographia”.14 Others break open the triangle to a baseline of regulation, market and higher education, and link each base concept to additional contextual detail.15 These approaches accommodate greater complexity but come at the expense of Clark’s clarity and simplicity.

Australia features in Clark’s work, highlighting a general public orientation, although tempered by respect for academic independence. The propensity to establish buffering bodies between

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government and tertiary education institutions is singled out, highlighting that “Australia is not short of intermediary bodies!”16 This conclusion was reached at a time when there were commissions for universities, advanced education and further education; all serving a small nation of 15 million people. Australia has near doubled in population since this time, and we have since lost these coordinating bodies. Higher education policymaking and financing power is now concentrated with the Commonwealth under direct ministerial control. There remain some intermediary structures for allocation and distribution of research funding – the Australian Research Council and National Health and Medical Research Council, for example – but the bulk of sector financing and regulation is the responsibility of the relevant minister.

Australia’s (and all systems’) relative position within the triangle of coordinating forces can be dynamic. Australian higher education has, since 1850, operated as a manifestation of public policy, but whilst we once embraced intermediary structures, we now operate with greater state influence. Even the temporary embrace of market forces through demand-driven funding has been withdrawn to see Commonwealth funding potentially manipulated by ministerial whim. Notwithstanding critique of Australian universities being under the control of “Moscow on the Molonglo”,17 Australia remains a far cry from systems (such as China) operating under stricter government control.

The literature has not fully explored the explicit ways in which state authority is made explicit in Australian higher education legislation. Clark provides a disciplinary and coordination lens through which to understand the heredity of higher education. Higher education financing legislation can be reviewed for references to disciplinary building blocks, and how these blocks might be maintained, arranged and rearranged across time. Clark’s work brings the invisible knowledge-related essence of academic work into view, and helps draw a thread between disciplines, institutions and systems of institutions. In the Australian context, financing of this knowledge work is almost exclusively channelled through institutions. To appreciate the institutional dimensions of policy and change, it is useful to turn to another American synonymous with institutional analysis, Clark Kerr.

Clark Kerr and The Uses of the University

Clark Kerr’s The uses of the university18 serves as a focal point for understanding the representation, significance and implications of the institution within Australian higher education financing legislation. Kerr’s work has already been described in Chapter One as central to the idea, and the mechanism by which heredity might operate in Australian higher education – “administrative rules powered by money”.19 Kerr’s insight goes beyond an elegant turn of phrase and includes a broad history of the developments in the evolution of universities and maturation of the American model of higher education. There are insights into the dynamic character of universities, acknowledging struggles of “keeping of the peace” and “furthering of progress”20 amid a complex array of internal and external stakeholder expectations. Inherent in what it means to be a university, and challenges of institutional leaders, is the mediation of “the tug of the anchor to the past with the pull of the Holy Grail of the future”.21

The tug and the pull that is inherent in higher education cannot be ascribed to an internal and external dichotomy. The forces that embody conservatism and innovation have both internal (academic organisation) and external (system-level) dimensions. It is a wonder the university can sustain itself when centrifugal internal differences could split it apart, and expectations of

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society could see it collapse in on itself. Kerr’s framing of higher education in The uses of the university is around the institution and speaks with enduring authority on how the institution interacts with its social, political, economic and international context.

The uses of the university emerged from the 1963 Harvard University Godkin Lectures. The lectures were appended with additional chapters approximately every decade from initial publication until the last additional chapter in 2000. Kerr bestowed higher education with page after page of enduringly quotable quotes.22 Higher education leaders and scholars have found Kerr irresistible across the decades as a means of articulating the purpose, or use of, “the” university.

The durability of Kerr’s original lectures combined with later additions exemplifies the power of insightful, clearly expressed prose that respects the past and future in equal measure. The past exerts a powerful influence over the future, yet there remains uncertainty, as the Kerr quote highlights: “Which way will this turn of history move the university: up or down?”23 One cannot simply assume linear extrapolation of past events into the future, nor ignore the impact “of conscious choice and action?”24

Whilst Kerr provides compelling insights into the complex nature of “the” university, and whose “administrative rules powered by money” is the causal mechanism by which heredity operates, we have an imperfect understanding of stability or variability in conceptions of “the” university within legislation. The increasingly complex nature of the university (comprised of many traditional and emergent disciplines, expanding to serve more in society, and fulfilling the skills needs of growing economies) makes it evidently more difficult to conceptualise and implement effective policy reform.

Trow, Clark and Kerr – A Sequoia Trinity

Martin Trow, Burton Clark and Clark Kerr have produced some of the most influential works on the topic of higher education systems. To pay respectful homage and provide a shorthand for describing their work, I propose the term “Sequoia Trinity”. This recognises their work holistically, the region in which their paths converge, and represents the consubstantial interactions between the disciplines within which academics are situated, the institutional structure of the university of which disciplines form the building blocks, and the higher education system created by universities and other higher education institutions. The relevance and impact of the Sequoia Trinity can be found in The dream is over,25 in which the relevance, impact and future of the Californian system of higher education is assessed by using Kerr, Clark and Trow as the conceptual anchor.

The term sequoia is chosen because Sequoiadendron giganteum – the giant sequoia – is the world’s largest tree and is found on the slopes of the Sierra Nevada, California. Trow, Clark and Kerr are giants in the field of higher education studies (and public policy). Each are as synonymous with California as its redwoods. The trinity is simply a representation of three, and whilst invoking metaphysical associations and eternal qualities of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit, in this case it simply represents scholars whose work I admire above all others. The following passages provide a brief account of how their lives and work intersected, and why their work is so pivotal to the construction of this dissertation.

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Kerr’s influence on higher education pre-dates and extends beyond the 1963 Godkin lectures. Kerr was the first Chancellor of the University of California Berkeley, and twelfth President of the University of California. He was involved in the development of The master plan for higher education in California 1960–1975.26 Kerr’s role as President of the University of California ended abruptly in 1967 with his dismissal by the Board of Regents in the aftermath of student protests and the Free Speech Movement. This was a shot that was heard around the world.27 As David Gardner, Kerr’s successor at the University of California describes it, Kerr had performed “a miracle for the University and the people of California”.28 However, shifting social and political expectations of the university, and the dismay with which Berkeley student protests were received, saw Ronald Reagan run a campaign for the California Governor to “clean up the mess at Berkeley”,29 and Kerr’s temporary fall from grace was assured. Kerr quipped at this dismissal, “I don’t expect to be unemployed very long,” 30 and was engaged to develop and lead the Carnegie Commission of Higher Education.31 The Commission catalysed further groundbreaking work on higher education, including The Carnegie Classification of Institutions of Higher Education. Kerr inspires a focus on legislation as “administrative rules”, documents a trend towards complexity in the multiversity through a centuries-long historical analysis, and catalysed an institutional taxonomy that can be used to track system characteristics. Kerr also played a role in the establishment of the Centre for Studies in Higher Education at Berkeley, for which both Clark and Trow were closely affiliated.32

Burton Clark also emerged from the University of California Berkeley, and along with Kerr and Trow (and others of the time) was responsible for what has been described as “the habitus for serious research in higher education, in California, the United States and the world”.33 Clark’s passing catalysed the publication of a series of essays in the London Review of Education in which the higher education system is described as a masterpiece.34 That British scholars of education would devote an edition of one of their most premier journals in Clark’s honour illustrates the capacity of Clark to transcend national boundaries, and yet integrate the nuances of diverse higher education systems into effortlessly readable, profound insights. Clark’s Berkeley roots informed his subsequent transition to roles at Harvard and Yale, eventually ending up at the University of California, Los Angeles. Later work included the publication of an international set of case studies under the title Creating entrepreneurial universities: Organizational pathways of transformation, which was as captivating and influential as his earlier work. The entrepreneurial university drew upon Monash University as one of its case studies, building a bridge between Australia and California, and describing key features of a university that, whilst young at the time, is now one of the world’s finest. Clark’s work positions this research in a holistic appreciation of relationships between the micro patterns of academic work and macro features of national and global systems of higher education. Heredity may involve public policy and legislation as administrative rules, but Clark ensures that these rules are contextualised by an appreciation of the role that disciplines play within institutional structures, and the role institutions play in higher education systems.

The final part of the trinity is Martin Trow, who commenced work at Berkeley in 1957 as an Assistant Professor of Sociology. He was Director of the Centre for Higher Education Studies from 1977 to 1987.35 For a time, Trow shared an office with Burton Clark36 and has been described as Burton Clark’s alter-ego37. Trow’s work in the transition of higher education systems originated as a paper for the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, and whilst informed by growth in the American system, was written for a global (although mainly European) audience. Subsequent work included regular comparative analysis

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of European higher education systems, but also included specific analysis of the Australian system prepared as part of an address at an event arranged by the Australian Vice-Chancellors’ Committee.38 At the time of his death in 2007, Trow was Professor Emeritus at Berkeley in Public Policy. Higher education is but one element of the notion of heredity this dissertation seeks to define. Higher education legislation is a function of public policy, and Trow’s connection to the discipline of public policy provides a stepping-stone to a theorisation of public policy that follows.

My exposure to this trinity began with a short certificate course in higher education management in the late-2000s. My doctoral supervisor, Professor Richard James, first shared the work of Trow, Clark and Kerr, creating a critical juncture to the world of higher education scholarship and setting a new personal path dependency. Trow’s writing on the past, present and future of Australian higher education exposed me to the notion of heredity, encouraging me to reach back even further in time to Ashby, and ultimately higher education legislation spanning the establishment of the University of Sydney through to 2020. At the time, my presumed destiny was one of continuing my professional path, closely connected to family origins and work in disability services.

Global Developments

Clark, Kerr and Trow have had a global impact. In positioning their work as an integrated trinity of interactions spanning disciplinary, institutional and societal perspectives, it is important to make a subtle distinction between societal influences over a single system, and global interconnections of higher education institutions. Comparative education research has been critiqued because it is so hamstrung by single country issues, and so dependent on the influence of local policy actors and social systems.39 Burton Clark is more caustic in his treatment of local issues:

To localise higher education is to risk becoming a permanent higher education back water.40

Simon Marginson adopts a global comparative approach in which he explores the global trends towards expansion.41 Marginson rejects a unified theory of system expansion, suggesting that change is contextual: a system’s transition to high-participation status may be explained by some, or all, of the identified explanations, with relative importance attributed to these explanations shifting across time. Marginson’s exploration of growth in participation is a salient reminder that there are epistemological and methodological challenges in pursuit of a deeper understanding of change in Australian higher education financing policy. He specifically critiques, for example, specific world systems explanations of the global trend towards high participation:

It is a very long stretch from policy mimetics to a single meta-system of higher education, a ‘world-society,’ and a ‘world polity.’ The claim lacks empirical grounding.42

The key insight relating to global developments relevant to this research is that to be too caught up in minutia of parochial Australian events and circumstance will diminish any transferable insights. This dissertation acknowledges but does not transcend these critiques. This study is unapologetically focused on single country issues, policy actors and social and

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economic factors. International comparisons and comparators are not ignored but are not a feature of this study. This research does, however, seek to engage with international perspectives by adopting within the research design: the insights of the trinity; financing legislation references to global developments in higher education; and consideration of international frameworks for understanding policy change. Attention now turns from the theory of higher education to the theory of public policy.

PUBLIC POLICY

This chapter explores international (and primarily American) literature for explanatory insight into the heredity of Australian higher education. As Trow, Kerr and Clark highlight, there is much higher education scholarship to build upon to better understand heredity. However strong this scholarship, there remain gaps in our knowledge around the policy detail of Australian higher education legislation. Subsequent sections traverse the conceptual terrain of public policy and nature of policy change for insights into the heredity of higher education. This moves from more general understandings of policy, and policy processes in Australia, to models of change in public policy.

Defining Policy and Legislation

Public policy can be defined as the sum total of government action.43 These actions are inordinately complicated. Government action can be considered as both specific intent (announcement of policy) as well as non-action (failure to respond to an issue). Intended actions may or may not be implemented, and the state may adopt a variety of policy instruments to achieve their aims. Public policy instruments include public expenditure, economic penalties (taxation), economic incentives (subsidies or different levels of taxation), behavioural rewards (conditions of funding), legal penalties (corporation law), public advertising, research and new regulation, to achieve government aims.44 Policy instruments, including legislation, are distinct from the common law – law that is based on precedents made by judges. Whichever policy instrument is deployed to resolve a particular policy challenge, there will usually be some form of legislation that gives authority and legitimacy to the instrument and related action. Legislation plays a critical role in the exercise of state power and control. Hayek criticises legislation on this basis, and its disruption of the natural order:

… the chief instrument of deliberate change in modern society is legislation.45

The Australian state inherited key principles and institutions from an English tradition46 but has become more complex across time. The Commonwealth of Australia came into being at Federation, building on the constitutional traditions of the states.47 The state and state decision-making are now dispersed across various levels of government (local, state and Commonwealth) with supranational interactions (e.g. the United Nations, G20, free trade agreements). The state exerts influence over markets and civil society. These complex interactions are known as multi-level governance.48

Interactions across levels of governance and tiers of government are guided by the Constitution. Section 52 of the Constitution lists 40 areas in which the Commonwealth is able to pass laws, which, notably, does not include education. There have been instances where state powers have been referred to the Commonwealth (specifically powers around higher

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education) and instances where disagreements between the Commonwealth and the states have been settled by the High Court.49

Australian parliaments operate with the inheritance of a Westminster tradition. This includes the conventions of responsible government involving three core activities and power structures: legislative, executive and judicial.50 Each Australian parliament operates under a Westminster tradition but operates with its own nuances. Queensland operates a unicameral parliament with no house of review. Tasmania elects its parliament with a voting system different to that of mainland states. The process of lawmaking is different in each legislature, with rules codified for the policy process in each chamber of each legislature.51

The executive is responsible for the administration and enforcement of law, and management of government resources. The core authority in executive government across the Commonwealth, state and territories resides with Cabinet. The Cabinet is made up of ministers and is the focal point for political and policy decisions. There is a causal chain of relationships and interactions between the electorate, parliament, Cabinet, ministers, department secretaries and public services and service providers to clients through which public policy is made, implemented and evaluated.52 Judicial powers involve the interpretation and application of law through the court system, although these are less frequently activated in relation to higher education financing policy.

Policy Stability and Reform

The power structures and relationships described above operate within complex, but orderly, processes, which include but are not limited to the policy cycle (described on page 33). This cycle is the ideal representation of policy processes that give rise to public policy. The idea that policy is a cycle can be critiqued on the basis of not adequately explaining where policy ideas originate, nor how well the stages align with the reality of public policy reform and change.53 There are near-infinite interactions between various policy cycles and policy actors that are not adequately delineated within an orderly and staged process. In the case of Australian higher education policy, one can ask, does policy begin or end with the education minister of today, or yesterday, a public servant, university, or some historic policy decision forgotten to all but a few?

These orderly and explicit processes described by the policy cycle in both theory and practice imply that policy actors behave rationally throughout the cycle. What is termed “comprehensive rationality” would see policy problems clearly defined, policy options devised, and policy choices made in clear alignment with policy values. This comprehensive rationality is considered unrealistic;54 public policy is too complex and multifaceted for policy actors to fully grasp or influence the intricacies of policy problems, solutions and processes. The policy cycle is akin instead to “a spirograph of many interacting circles and portray multi-directional arrows linked each stage”.55 This complexity of processes is useful to hold in mind when considering the breadth of legislation that universities currently grapple with, and the rate with which some items of legislation are amended.

Assumptions of rationality are critiqued across a range of disciplines. Lakomski highlights the cognitive limitations of what can be known in an exploration of educational leadership.56 Argyris critiques the rationality of actors in organisational settings with the theory of action, suggesting a tendency for people to work in ways that are not based on valid information.57

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The standard assumptions of neoclassical economics around homo economicus, or “economic man”, are also critiqued on the basis of rationality.58 Simon suggests that:

Simplifications of the real world for purposes of choice introduce discrepancies between the simplified model and the reality.59

The cited critiques of rationality are informed by different disciplinary traditions: Lakomski adopts the philosophy of education perspective; Argyris is based on behavioural observation; and Simon uses mathematical models. Each approach arrives at similar conclusions: there are limits to rationality – rationality is bounded – and there is a tendency to take shortcuts in processing information to inform actions and choices. These shortcuts can become deeply embedded in individual thought processes and collective action, and they are formalised in policy processes and structures, including legislation. Imperfect people acting on imperfect information, and within time and resourcing constraints, set up behavioural norms that produce entrenched imperfect results.

The strength of these behavioural norms is postulated as a brake on policy change and innovation. Institutionalism, path dependencies and Punctuated Equilibrium Theory are public policy frameworks for which bounded rationality is an important explanatory factor. Some of these theories are described in more detail below. Whilst bounded rationality may impede policy change, it is self-evident that deliberate policy change occurs, with a resulting positive intended impact. Australia’s world record of 29 years of economic growth was stopped in its tracks only by the global pandemic. Across this timeframe, Australian policy makers acted with deliberate intent (to grow the economy), and their influence over public policy has been successful (the economy grew).

Bounded rationality, embedded in behavioural norms of policy actors, suggests that one would expect to see stability in higher education financing legislation. There is, however, an observed high frequency of legislative change across the history of Australian higher education. It may be that the observed changes are merely superficial, representing adaptation to a broader policy ecology without changing the essential characteristics of higher education. They might also represent simple tweaks and adjustments that contribute to system stasis, such as incremental budget increases to align with inflation. Both explanations would align with a bounded rationality explanation. The types of changes may also represent a more dynamic multifactor response to social and economic forces that overwhelm any entrenched policy positions. The heredity that this dissertation seeks to define may involve some or all of these features at various points in time. Systematic analysis of higher education financing legislation has the potential to assess whether legislative change represents substantive policy change, or inconsequential minor amendments, for which core features of the system are conserved and maintained. The general absence of literature focused on higher education financing legislation makes it difficult to assess which of these explanations are valid.

The extrapolation of bounded rationality and variant descriptions of the limitations of human cognition and action is used to explain inertia in policy and organisational behaviour. This is a central claim of historic institutionalism and path dependency.60 Once a policy sub-system has been established, it can be difficult to change. The pathway from potentially random stimuli, behaviours and choices to institutionalised behaviours, power structures and rules is neither instantaneous nor isolated from other developments. A three-phase dynamic framework for how organisations become path dependent has been proposed.61 Singular events may, at

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“critical junctures”, reinforce themselves to “self-reinforcing dynamics” that may eventually become locked-in.

The rationality or otherwise of the policy process, and the mechanisms by which legislation, or components of legislation, are self-reinforcing or locked-in, has utility in better understanding patterns of legislative change in Australian higher education. Glyn Davis cited path dependencies and critical junctures in work that sought to understand the Australian idea of the university.62 This study examines financing legislation to clarify whether critical junctures are evident and whether specific ideas about academic work, institutions and role that higher education plays in broader society are locked-in as key inherited characteristics of the heredity of Australian higher education.

Frameworks that examine change and stability in policy over the long term include the Advocacy Coalition Framework, Punctuated Equilibrium Theory and Multiple Streams. Each accepts that bounded rationality and path dependency can make major policy change more difficult to achieve, and the specifics of each framework are addressed in turn. Each also confronts the reality that major policy changes do occur and seek to provide an explanation of the underlying causal mechanisms. Subsequent passages briefly describe models of policy change and reform to contextualise how observable changes in higher education legislation might be analysed, rather than opening up a new frontier for research that seeks to define with precision the causality of legislative changes.

The Advocacy Coalition Framework characterises relationships between coalitions and policy sub-systems as a dynamic long-term feedback mechanism that can both impede and catalyse major change, and which is distinct from a discrete policy cycle with defined start and end points.63 Sabatier places “belief” as the primary factor driving coalitions of actors to influence public policy. Sabatier’s categories of belief include deep core beliefs, policy core beliefs and secondary beliefs. Deep core beliefs can be equated to values intrinsic to identity (and might include views on whether post-compulsory education is a valuable thing). Policy core beliefs relate to how these values may be applied to a broad policy system (and might include whether individuals should contribute to the cost of their higher education). Secondary beliefs relate to more specific policy implementation issues (which might relate to administrative rules such as the minimum income threshold for repayment of income-contingent loans). Sabatier distils a world of complex problems, competition for attention to solve these problems, and choices in how these problems might be resolved through public policy, into coalitions of policy actors operating within policy sub-systems to advocate for specific policy outcomes based on shared belief.64

The term “sub-systems” is significant in this context as it suggests that a macro approach is necessary to understand changes in policy. Change can be understood through the activities of policy actors in both public and private sectors, across multiple levels of government within a policy sub-system. They reject too narrow a focus on specific policy decisions or a specific piece of legislation as this may render important contributing factors to reform beyond the frame of research. Sabatier’s emphasis on policy sub-system rather than specific decision or legislation might render this dissertation and its focus on legislation redundant. However, through examining financing legislation over the long term, no single item of legislation is considered in isolation. Further, some legislation is clearly more important than others. HESA, for example, operates as a complex and multidimensional item of legislation allocating grants

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for a range of teaching and research activities, and mediates interactions between higher education and the taxation system. To consign HESA to irrelevance as a single artefact of a complex policy sub-system would ignore its inherent and evolving complexity.

The Advocacy Coalition Framework has been applied to various studies of change in higher education, including work by Cerych and Sabatier.65 Through case studies of policy implementation in European higher education reforms, Cerych and Sabatier grapple with the nature of change in higher education reform. They describe the importance of advocacy coalitions in achievement of more effective policy implementation. The Advocacy Coalition Framework has been applied to Australian school equity policy,66 and media censorship,67 but no studies have been identified that examine Australian higher education financing through this conceptual lens. This dissertation does not seek to emulate the methodologies associated with the Advocacy Coalition Framework. It does, however, draw upon this framework to understand substantive changes in observed legislative sub-systems (Chapter Seven), and in exploration of how insights emerging from heredity might be applied (Chapter Eight).

The Advocacy Coalition Framework is concerned with the behaviours of policy actors and the formation of coalitions to influence a policy outcome. This provides a window to the process of change, but limitations remain around explaining observed patterns of policy change, particularly those that might be considered transformational. Baumgartner and Jones68 address this problem through Punctuated Equilibrium Theory. This framework is concerned with these transformations, the punctuation of major discontinuous change in the face of stability, or policy equilibrium. The title of this framework is inspired by evolutionary biology and analysis of the fossil record, where periods of incremental evolutionary change are punctuated by rapid rates of new species formation.69

Baumgartner and Jones highlight the stable nature of institutions and policy monopolies as a function of bounded rationality. This makes it difficult for alternative agendas to gain attention within policy processes.70 The complexity of issues that must be managed by policy makers lends itself to heuristics and shortcuts in the process by which attention is attributed to specific issues, the attributes that are then associated to specific problems, the alternatives considered in response, and finally coming to a decision. In a world where there are near-infinite problems warranting attention, and finite limitations to the information-processing capabilities of policy actors, the net result is that general stability prevails over change.

Jones and Baumgartner derive their model empirically, quantifying changes in program budget appropriations.71 There is a “hyper-incrementalism” in changes to budget appropriations across time, with most spending programs facing minor increases or decreases, and a much lower frequency of programs facing major increases or decreases. The trajectory of policy in this context is powerfully maintained, with changes in any specific policy sub-field a rarer, but readily quantified and regularly observed, occurrence.

As with the Advocacy Coalition Framework, Punctuated Equilibrium Theory emphasises the role of policy actors in the policy process. Information processing constraints at an individual level affect what issues are considered, problematised and responded to, producing general incremental change and rarer transformational change. Again, this dissertation does not seek to apply the specific model or methodologies associated with Punctuated Equilibrium Theory to Australian higher education legislation. Its relevance is conceptual in encouraging the research to define what might be considered an equilibrium in financing legislation, and how

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often this equilibrium is disrupted by more substantive change, which also must be defined and isolated. Like the Advocacy Coalition Framework, it also has relevance for understanding major changes to legislation sub-systems (Chapter Seven), and how insights emerging from heredity might be usefully applied (Chapter Eight).

Both Advocacy Coalition Framework and Punctuated Equilibrium Theory integrate a long-term perspective whilst maintaining a connection to observable and documented ideas and behaviours. Monear sought to test the validity of both through a case study approach across five state higher education systems in America.72 Monear concludes that Punctuated Equilibrium Theory better explained major change, whilst Advocacy Coalition Framework was better at explaining periods of stability. These frameworks have also informed the analysis of the role of evidence in higher education policymaking.73 To the best of the author’s knowledge, no published studies have utilised these frameworks to understand the nature of stability and change in higher education financing in the Australian context.

Kingdon takes an alternative view to the process of change in public policy, suggesting that significant reforms require the confluence of three major streams: a problem that captures attention; the emergence of a policy solution; and a favourable political context.74 The confluence of these major streams can open a policy window where reform is possible. Policy actors must strike whilst the iron is hot – to get one’s ducks in a row – or run the risk that the window for major reform will close. This work fits into a “garbage can” theory of public policy; one in which there is an “organised anarchy” in public policy.75 There are so many competing actors, ideas, priorities and activities underway that the rationality of policymaking is illusory – major change is serendipitous.

As with Punctuated Equilibrium Theory, applying the framework of Multiple Streams to Australian higher education financing legislation confronts an empirical reality of frequent legislative change that is not readily understood. It may be that the policy window is always open, or that the prospect of major change is so hard that only incremental, insignificant change is possible. The absence of a clear taxonomy of what constitutes major higher education financing change makes it difficult to assert with confidence whether any of these explanations has greater validity.

HEREDITY AS AN INTEGRATED HIGHER EDUCATION PUBLIC POLICY CYCLE

The frameworks described in the preceding sections were instrumental in the development of this dissertation. Initial forays into understanding the nature of higher education and related patterns of change and transformation revealed enormous complexity, and contradictory findings from seemingly authoritative texts. The more financing legislation that was initially examined, the more confounding the observations. As one adviser remarked at an early point of candidature, there was a dark and dense forest of higher education legislative data, and I was armed only with a dim flashlight to make sense of it all. Preceding sections pay homage to the writers and scholarship that turned the dark into light and equipped me with the means of making sense of the legislative ecosystem. This extends from major habitats (jurisdictions), dominant flora (primary financing legislation), the significance of fallen trees (historic superseded legislation), and the genetic code of each organism (specific legal clauses and text). This ecosystem operates as an integrated higher education public policy cycle, as depicted in Figure 3.

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Figure 3. Heredity – An Integrated Higher Education Public Policy Cycle

Higher education is a complicated social system. Individuals are exposed to sophisticated learning opportunities informed by academics who are the custodians of knowledge acquired through scholarship and research. Individuals are the heart of the system; students and staff. Academics are clustered around knowledge domains and disciplines that have, over time, refined conceptual frameworks and methodologies to explain the world. These academic communities have found a home in the institutional form of the university. The university has proven to be a highly effective and resilient structure that delivers enormous benefits to the students that pass through and graduate. Demand and supply for university activities has steadily increased across time, spanning a proliferation of disciplines, an expanding frontier of knowledge, and greater integration of universities with social and economic affairs. Much of this expansion in an Australian context has been made possible by public policy, including specific legislation that finances universities to employ academics to teach students and undertake research. This leads to integrated cycles of public policy and higher education for which legislation is a tangible artefact. The higher education dimensions of this cycle have consubstantial features, exemplified by Clark, Kerr and Trow.

The public policy dimensions of the integrated heredity cycle are also a complicated social system. Spirographs of policy cycles are difficult to unravel into neatly defined and isolated causal chains of events spanning policy actors to policies, their implementation and impact. Australia’s Westminster system of government gives a structure to the policy process, producing artefacts that allow for research and exploration. International literature suggests that policy systems trend towards institutionalised path dependencies and policy inertia. Complex policy systems are occupied by policy monopolists who tend to favour the status quo. Policy change in this context is hard. Getting the attention of a government’s executive branch to prioritise new policy and legislation requires them to direct attention to a specific issue when there are near-infinite competing priorities.

For reasons not well understood or documented, Australian higher education appears to be prone to a regular activation of the higher education public policy cycle. There is a high frequency of legislation relating to higher education financing that has been documented in this dissertation’s preceding chapters. This frequency of legislation appears to be at odds with key tenants of public policy literature. We should see less change rather than more, or we expect to see only minor change rather than major change. However, the archive of scholarship into Australian higher education legislation gives few clues that explain the

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frequency or nature of change. Further, we do not know if this is a key feature of the system’s heredity. Will this pattern of change come to an abrupt halt, or can we expect similar or increasing frequencies of legislative change into the future? The following chapter describes the methods by which a legislative conceptualisation of heredity, entwined with an integrated higher education public policy cycle, might better understand the past and help plausible predictions of the future.

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1 Martin Trow, Problems in the transition from elite to mass higher education (Carnegie Commission on Higher Education, 1973), 1.

2 Clark Kerr, The uses of the university (Harvard University Press, 2005), 8.

3 Trow, Problems in the transition from elite to mass higher education

4 Simon Marginson, The dream is over: The crisis of Clark Kerr’s California idea of higher education (University of California Press, 2016).

5 Simon Marginson, “The worldwide trend to high participation higher education: Dynamics of social stratification in inclusive systems,” Higher Education, 72, no. 4 (2016): 413–434.

6 See: Department of Employment, Education and Training, The transition from elite to mass higher education: Conference proceedings, 15 June–18 June, Darling Harbour, Sydney, Australia (Department of Employment, Education, and Training, Higher Education Division; Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, 1993).; Tim Pitman, “Reinterpreting higher education quality in response to policies of mass education: The Australian experience,” Quality in Higher Education, 20, no. 3, (2014), 348–363).; and Belinda Probert, The era of universal participation in higher education: Australian policy problems in relation to cost, equity and quality (Occasional paper for Higher Education Research and Development Society of Australasia (HERDSA) 2016).

7 Committee on the Future of Tertiary Education in Australia, Tertiary education in Australia, (Committee on the Future of Tertiary Education in Australia, Canberra, ACT: Australian Government Publishing Service, 1964), 11.

8 Matt Brett, Equity performance and accountability (National Centre for Student Equity in Higher Education, Curtin University, 2018), 19.

9 Trow, Problems in the transition from elite to mass higher education, 35.

10 Simon Marginson, “High participation systems of higher education” The Journal of Higher Education, 87, no. 2, (2016): 243–271.

11 Burton Clark, The higher education system: Academic organization in cross-national perspective (University of California Press, 1983).

12 Ibid, 4.

13 Simon Marginson and Gary Rhoades, “Beyond national states, markets, and systems of higher education: A glonacal agency heuristic,” Higher Education, 43, no. 3, (2002): 281–309.

14 Jose Salazar and Peodair Leihy, “Keeping up with coordination: From Clark’s triangle to microcosmographia,” Studies in Higher Education, 38, no. 1, (2013): 53–70.

15 Richard. C. Richardson and Thomas R. Smalling, “Accountability and governance” Achieving accountability in higher education: Balancing public, academic, and market demands, ed, Joseph Burke (Josey Bass, 2005), 55–77.

16 Clark, The higher education system: Academic organization in cross-national perspective, 142.

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17 W. Max Corden, “Australian universities: Moscow on the Molonglo,” Quadrant, 49, no. 11 (2005), 7.

18 Kerr, The uses of the university

19 Ibid, 15.

20 Ibid, 29.

21 Ibid, 29.

22 Sir Zelman Cowan quotes Kerr directly, describing “environmental suitors” and propensity of faculty to “coalesce feverishly over a grievance about some episode related to a change of the calendar or a parking fee.”: Sir Zelman Cowan, The Sir Robert Garran Oration: Some thoughts on the Australian Universities, (Royal Institute of Public Administration (ACT Group), 1970), retrieved 1 October 2020, https://www.ipaa.org.au/wp-content/uploads/2019/07/1970-Garran-Oration-Zelman-Cowen.pdf; In the 2010 Boyer Lectures, Glyn Davis refers to Kerr’s university as “a series of diverse organisational units and individuals only held together, he quipped, by a common grievance over parking”: Glyn Davis, Boyer Lectures 2010: The republic of learning (Australian Broadcasting Corporation, 2010), published 14 November 2010, https://www.abc.net.au/radionational/programs/boyerlectures/series/boyer-lectures-2010-the-republic-of-learning/2981312

23 Kerr, The uses of the university, 196.

24 Ibid.

25 Simon Marginson, The dream is over: The crisis of Clark Kerr’s California idea of higher education (University of California Press, 2016).

26 California State Department of Education, A master plan for higher education in California, 1960–1975 (California State Department of Education, 1960).

27 Sheldon Rothblatt, “Clark Kerr: two voices,” Clark Kerr's world of higher education reaches the 21st century, ed, Sheldon Rothblatt, (Springer, Netherlands, 2012), 1 – 42.

28 David Pierpont Gardner, “Clark Kerr: Triumphs and turmoil,” Clark Kerr's world of higher education reaches the 21st century, ed, Sheldon Rothblatt, (Springer, Netherlands, 2012), 230.

29 Ibid.

30 John Aubrey Douglass, The Carnegie Commission and council on higher education: A retrospective. Research & occasional paper series: CSHE.14.05 (Center for Studies in Higher Education 2005), 1.

31 Ibid.

32 Centre for Studies in Higher Education, “History of CSHE, Centre for Studies of Higher Education, University of California Berkeley,” (Centre for Studies in Higher Education) retrieved 1 June 2020, https://cshe.berkeley.edu/about/history-cshe.

33 Peter Scott, “Burton Clark’s half century: Selected writings 1956–2006,” London Review of Education, 8, no. 3 (2010):273–280, 274.

34 Michael Shattock, “The entrepreneurial university: An idea for its time,” London Review of Education, 8, no. 3 (2010): 263–271, 205.

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35 Centre for Studies in Higher Education, “History of CSHE, Centre for Studies of Higher Education, University of California Berkeley”.

36 University of California Berkeley, “Martin Trow, leading scholar in higher education studies, dies at 80,” (University of California, Berkeley, 2007), retrieved 1 June 2020, https://www.berkeley.edu/news/media/releases/2007/03/02_trow.shtml.

37 Scott, “Burton Clark’s half century: Selected writings 1956–2006”, 274.

38 Martin Trow, “Defining the issues in university-government relations: An international perspective,” Studies in Higher Education, 8, no. 2 (1983); 115–128.

39 David John Frank and Jay Gabler, Reconstructing the university: Worldwide shifts in academia in the 20th century (Stanford University Press, 2006).

40 Clark, The higher education system: Academic organization in cross-national perspective, 232.

41 Marginson, “High participation systems of higher education”.

42 Ibid, 263.

43 Paul Cairney, Understanding public policy: Theories and issues (Palgrave Macmillan 2012), 5.

44 Ibid, 26.

45 Frederick A. Hayek, Law, legislation and liberty: A new statement of the liberal principles of justice and political economy (Routledge, 2013), 62.

46 Russell Hinchy, The Australian legal system: History, institutions and method, (Thomson Reuters, 2015).

47 Gerard Carney, The constitutional systems of the Australian states and territories, (Cambridge University Press, 2006).

48 Katherine A. Daniell and Adrian Kay, “Multi-level governance: An introduction,” Multi-level governance: Conceptual challenges and case studies from Australia, eds, Katherine A. Daniell and Adrian Kay (ANU Press, 2017), 3–32.

49 Carney, The constitutional systems of the Australian states and territories

50 Catherine Althaus, Peter Bridgman, and Glyn Davis, The Australian Policy Handbook: A practical guide to the policy making process (Allen and Ulwin, 2017)

51 In the Commonwealth, the processes and procedures are codified in: David Elder, House of Representatives Practice, 7th Edition (Department of the House of Representatives, 2018).; and ed, James Rowland Odgers, Odgers’ Australian Senate Practice 14th edition, ed, Harry Evans and Rosemary Laing, (Department of the Senate, 2020).

52 Australian Public Service Commission, Delivering performance and accountability (Australian Public Service Commission, 2018), retrieved 1 June 2020, https://www.apsc.gov.au/delivering-performance-and-accountability

53 Cairney, Understanding public policy: Theories and issues, 34.

54 Ibid, 14.

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55 Paul Cairney, “The role of evidence in theories of the policy process,” The politics of evidence-based policy making, ed, Paul Cairney (Palgrave Pivot, London, 2016), 13–50, 18.

56 Gabrielle Lakomski, Managing without leadership. Towards a theory of organizational functioning (Elsevier, Oxford, UK, 2005).

57 Chris Argyris “Double loop learning in organizations,” Harvard Business Review, 55, no. 5 (1977): 115–125.

58 See: Herbert A. Simon, “A behavioral model of rational choice,” The Quarterly Journal of Economics, 69, no. 1 (1955): 99–118.; and, Peter Fleming, The death of homo economicus (University of Chicago Press, Economics Books, 2017).

59 Simon, “A behavioral model of rational choice”, 114.

60 Ian Greener, “The potential of path dependence in political studies,” Politics, 25, no. 1 (2005): 62–72.

61 Jörg Sydow, Georg Schreyögg, and Jochen Koch. "Organizational path dependence: Opening the black box," Academy of management review 34, no. 4 (2009): 689-709.

62 Glyn Davis, “The Australian idea of a university” Meanjin, 72, no. 3 (2013): 32.

63 Paul A. Sabatier, “An advocacy coalition framework of policy change and the role of policy-oriented learning therein,” Policy Sciences, 21, no. 2–3 (1988): 129–168.

64 Daniel A. Mazmanian and Paul A. Sabatier, Implementation and Public Policy, with a New Postscript (University of America Press, 1989), 305.

65 Ladislav Cerych and Paul A. Sabatier, Great expectations and mixed performance: The implementation of higher education reforms in Europe. (Trentham Books, 1986).

66 Ann Morrow, The politics of educational disadvantage: The impact of central government policies on secondary schools’ capacities to improve educational outcomes for their socially disadvantaged students (Doctoral dissertation, University of Melbourne, 2004).

67 Peter John Chen, Australia’s online censorship regime: The advocacy coalition framework and governance compared (Doctoral dissertation, Australian National University, 2000).

68 Frank R. Baumgartner and Bryan D. Jones, Agendas and instability in American politics (University of Chicago Press, 2010).

69 Stephen Jay Gould, Punctuated equilibrium (Harvard University Press, 2009).

70 Bryan D. Jones and Frank R. Baumgartner, The politics of attention: How government prioritizes problems (University of Chicago Press, 2005).

71 Ibid, 111.

72 Daryl A. Monear, Explaining stability and upheaval in state-level higher education governance: A multiple-case study analysis using Advocacy Coalition Theory and Punctuated Equilibrium Theory (Doctoral dissertation, University of Washington, 2008).

73 Eric C. Ness, "The role of information in the policy process: Implications for the examination of research utilization in higher education policy," Higher education: Handbook of theory and research, (Springer, Dordrecht, 2010). 1-49.

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74 Kingdon, John W. Agendas, Alternatives, and Public Policies (Little, Brown. 1984).

75 Cairney, Understanding public policy: Theories and issues, 232.

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CHAPTER FOUR: A MODEL OF HEREDITY FOR AUSTRALIAN HIGHER EDUCATION

From the hindsight of a half-century of research (and old age) I believe that training graduate students by means of theory-defined hypothesises takes them precisely in the wrong direction – at least when they tackle the character of such complicated systems as universities and colleges. As these fledgling researchers abstract variables from particular contexts, they move away from interactions among basic features that propel actual decision making. They assume that all other factors embedded in certain local settings play out elsewhere. They do not. No wonder research knowledge is so different from practitioner knowledge! It is often useless to the people running things.

Burton Clark (2008) On higher education: Selected writings, 1956–20061

In theorising higher education and public policy, Chapter Three positions Burton Clark as a giant of the field whose insights provide a theoretical lens through which to better define the heredity of Australian higher education. In pursuing an abstract model of heredity, itself comprised of abstract models of higher education and public policy, the research is at risk of falling into theory-rich irrelevance. Clark’s advice to graduate researchers is central to this chapter. In exploring conceptions of heredity, this research might be considered abstract in nature and theory-focused, but its conceptual origins and motivations are sound. This research may be atypical for its legislation focus, but even a cursory review of patterns of legislation amendment suggests that there is much to learn about Australian higher education legislation across its history. The broad positioning of the research, contemplating the future through exploration of the past, is valid. This positioning is applied to a particular domain (policy and legislation). Analysis of financing legislation from 1850 to 2020, with appropriate methodological rigour, should generate findings of individual, scholarly and practical relevance. Subsequent sections articulate a theoretical position, research design and research methods. All of which aim to generate valid and generalisable findings that are useful rather than useless.

THEORETICAL POSITIONING OF THIS RESEARCH

Research is undertaken to improve an understanding of the world. A central requirement of a doctoral study is to make new contributions to knowledge through research. The research process involves assumptions about the nature of the world, which informs the processes by which knowledge claims can be made, and the procedures and techniques that should be deployed to advance our knowledge. Waring encourages researchers to be clear about their theoretical position, mindful of the assumptions that may influence research design and the knowledge claims that can be made as a result.2

This dissertation seeks to better understand the heredity of Australian higher education financing legislation. The legislation within the scope for analysis is sourced from a repository – the Australasian Legal Information Institute (AustLII)3 – which includes all legislation enacted by colonial, state, Commonwealth and territory legislatures. The characteristics of legislation at various points across the history of Australian higher education will vary due to differences

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in legal, political and social processes that operate across time, necessitating caution in any direct comparisons.

Legislation is a product of a policy process. Whilst legislation is a central focus, there is some need to extend analysis to the policy cycle and process from which legislation originates. The primary policy process reference points utilised are the Hansard record, particularly ministerial second reading speeches, and reports of parliamentary enquiries. These reference points emerge from the policy process, but do not capture in full the conversations, backroom deals, non-verbal communications, advocacy coalitions, policy monopolies and other important aspects of the policy process. Hansard and other documents provide insight but do not fully represent the complexity of policy process, again necessitating caution in any inferences derived from the Hansard record.

This dissertation seeks to deconstruct legislation to its component parts for comparison across specific timeframes. There are multiple methods and conceptual framings by which higher education financing legislation and timeframes can be segmented for analysis. Typologies of higher education financing mechanisms have been described.4 Australian higher education policy can also be segmented by key phases in its history, such as the binary and unified national systems.5 There is, however, no agreed typology for categorising legislation as financing related or otherwise. The framework developed for categorising Australian higher education financing within this legislation is novel and arises from an inductive exploration of legislation repositories.

In the social sciences, the state of the world is not readily separated from the values and beliefs of the researcher.6 Researcher preferences in their worldview will permeate their research. The natural and physical sciences will favour an empiricist and rational tradition where the researcher is separated from observations, and where evidence takes precedence over logic, reasoning and intuition. There is a role for empiricism in social sciences, with positivist worldviews expounding that knowledge is grounded in natural phenomena. However, empirical evidence of natural phenomena within the social sciences does need to be interpreted through logic and rationality in the knowledge production process.

An alternative to positivist and empiricist traditions is that of the constructivist worldview, in which knowledge is a construct of the human mind. Under the constructivist tradition the natural world is independent of the human mind but attempts to make sense of it are mediated by human constructs and models. There is no single model or construct that can best generate knowledge of the world. Participants in the social world will generate their own meanings and may deploy a variety of methods to generate knowledge.

Disciplinary traditions align more or less closely with positivist, empiricist and constructivist orientations through, and as Biglan describes, relative emphasis on hard and soft, and pure and applied dimensions.7 It is tempting to see these research philosophies and traditions as strictly delineated, with binaries between neutral observation and created meaning. A pragmatic perspective allows researchers to proceed without a strong commitment to any single philosophy of research.8 The pragmatic worldview allows researchers freedom of choice to generate methods that best meet the underlying purpose, which may vary according to social, historical and political contexts. Higher education studies were categorised at the extremes of soft and applied dimensions within Biglan’s classification, making them particularly suited to a pragmatic approach.

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Studies of higher education do not impose strict methodological conventions, and the borrowing of methodologies (and research positions) from other traditions is necessary. Higher education is described as a “theme of research, rather than a discipline”.9 This research ultimately falls within a social pragmatic worldview,10 although retains a preference for observable empirical evidence in a positivist tradition. This pragmatic approach is well suited to the research design, given the breadth of time within the scope for analysis, the multiplicity of legislatures and the nature of transformation of higher education that the study seeks to understand. The research is consistent with scholarship in disciplines of sociology (policy genealogy) and public policy (path dependency) but is unashamedly a study of higher education. The choice of the term “heredity” is motivated by and derived from higher education scholarship, notably Ashby and Trow. If one was to accept comments that higher education is a theme and not a discipline, then this research is situated more closely with public policy. The relevance of specific terms, and the position within Biglan’s classification, are outlined in Figure 4.

Figure 4. Heredity of Higher Education Mapped to Biglan’s Classification

RESEARCH DESIGN: APPLICATION OF A MODEL OF HEREDITY

The research design examines Australian higher education financing legislation. This is defined as higher education-related legislation with a direct and explicit reference to the distribution of public funds, or right to access private funds, and any subsequent amendments to this legislation. This legislation is the product of a broader social process that involves higher education activity and public policy processes. These social processes approximate a higher education-specific policy cycle in which various social, economic and political influences cause governments to introduce higher education financing related bills into parliament. The

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resulting legislation is subject to broader social processes that interpret this legislation and enable higher education-related activities.

The dynamic interplay between higher education and public policy is embodied in financing legislation (and other legislative and policy instruments). This research positions financing legislation as part of the metaphoric “genetic code” that shapes higher education and, as with DNA, can be subject to evolutionary forces across time. The heredity of higher education can be inferred from analysis of financing legislation and provides a mechanism of understanding the past and making credible inferences about the future. The research places select financing legislation under scrutiny between 1850 and 2020 to answer the overarching question:

What is the heredity of Australian higher education?

The high-level and general nature of this question leads to more detailed sub-questions:

1) To what extent is Australian higher education financing legislation influenced by the legislative and policy context in which this legislation arises?

2) What patterns are observed in Australian higher education financing legislation across jurisdictions and across its history, spanning 1850 to 2020?

3) What is the relative importance of environmental adaptive pressures that catalyse the introduction and amendment of Australian higher education financing legislation, including but not limited to: a. references to disciplinary structures and conventions within financing legislation

and associated policymaking processes b. references to “the university” and institutional factors within financing legislation

and as adaptive pressures in associated policymaking processes c. references to the broader society in which universities operate, manifesting as

specific responses to social and economic demands within financing legislation and associated policymaking processes

d. references to global developments in higher education that extend beyond the confines of Australian policy systems within financing legislation and associated policymaking processes?

4) What practical relevance can be gleaned from an appreciation of the heredity of Australian higher education?

These questions, the dynamic interplay between higher education and their relevance for the research design are represented diagrammatically in Figure 3 on page 52.

Over the timeframes under consideration, there have been repeated cycles of higher education financing legislation. Thousands of items of legislation have been passed across colonial, state and Commonwealth legislatures since 1850. A subset of this legislation relates to higher education, of which a further subset relates to higher education financing. As literature in policy studies suggests, examining legislation in isolation can obscure more important social processes that give rise to legislation, and its implementation. There is, however, limited research that examines higher education legislation. There is a resulting need to critically refine legislation within the scope for analysis. The research could be spread too thin by adopting too broad a definition, or place discoverable insights out of reach by too narrow a definition.

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Expediency necessitates a balance between analytical depth and breadth. This balance is achieved by segmenting the history of Australian higher education financing across two distinct periods: the “foundational era” of the system, spanning 1850 to 1950, and the period spanning “Commonwealth funding” of the sector, spanning 1951 to 2020. The Commonwealth funding period is further segmented by considering financing legislation that precedes the unified national system in 1988. Post-Dawkins and the unified national system, legislation is further refined to the primary financing legislation: the Higher Education Funding Act 1988 (HEFA) and Higher Education Support Act 2003 (HESA). The rising complexity of post-Dawkins legislation necessitates a narrowing of focus, legitimised by recognition of the influence exerted on higher education funding by these Acts.

As described on page 25, Australian universities now intersect with a considerable volume of legislation that has financing legislation characteristics. This places beyond scope important legislative developments deterministic of the system, including new universities established in the Dawkins era and research funding legislation. University establishment and research legislation is peripheral to the central thesis. Financing references within university acts were progressively deleted as the Commonwealth took on greater responsibility for financing11. Funding for teaching exceeds funding for research12.

The foundational era spans the origins of Australian higher education with the University of Sydney, to the point at which a “system” of higher education can be considered to emerge with a second university being established in New South Wales. 1950 also marks a transition point after which the Commonwealth introduced legislation to specifically fund universities with the States Grants (Universities) Act 1951.

It should be noted that Commonwealth legislation relating to universities is evident prior to 1951. This includes legislation enabling the Australian National University in 1946, the Institute of Science and Industry in 1920, and Medical Research Endowment in 1937. This legislation is acknowledged as important to the process by which the Commonwealth begins and matures its involvement in higher education, but it is legislation passed in 1951 and thereafter that attracts closer scrutiny. Similarly, whilst there is a shared responsibility for funding universities between states and the Commonwealth from 1950 to the early 1970s, state financing legislation from 1950 to 1970 is also placed out of the scope for analysis. This also requires that any knowledge claims emerging from this research come with caveats on methodological grounds.

The methodology for identifying and analysing legislation within this research is depicted in Figure 5. The research and inclusion and exclusion criteria emerge from an iterative and inductive approach that emerges from immersion and review of legislation across time.

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Figure 5. Criteria for Selection of Legislation and Analysis

Through applying this approach to legislation across the foundational era and state legislation spanning 1850 to 1950, the research identified 322 items of legislation within the scope for analysis. Applying this approach to Commonwealth legislation from the period 1951 to 1988, identifies 173 items of legislation. Of the two remaining items of legislation, HEFA has been amended 56 times since enacted, and HESA 71 times. Altogether this represents over 600 items of legislation, and over 600 discrete policy cycles that provide a rich and complex dataset in which to examine the heredity of Australian higher education.

RESEARCH METHODS AND DATA SOURCES Foundational Financing Legislation

In the establishment of Australian higher education, each colony, state and territory was served by a single university. The relevant legislature supported the establishment and operations of this university through financing legislation. This legislation included the introduction and refinement of various financing mechanisms. These financing mechanisms included the university’s endowment, or fixed entitlement to annual funding, which was described in each university’s enabling legislation. Additional legislation was also identified beyond a university’s enabling legislation endowment.

Financing legislation across six legislatures active in higher education from 1850 to 1950 is examined: New South Wales, Victoria, South Australia, Tasmania, Western Australia and Queensland. The Commonwealth is excluded from analysis. The primary reference point for identifying legislation across these legislatures is the Australian Legal Information Institute’s

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(AustLII) databases of historical Acts. For each legislature in which legislation is held by AustLII, a keyword search for higher education and university-related terminology was undertaken.

Keyword searches for documents across the establishment of Australian higher education were useful for identifying relevant legislation, but not without limitations. The AustLII search function does not guarantee keywords will be identified. AustLII stores electronic scans of historic legislation in portable document format (PDF) that have been subject to optical character recognition (OCR) technology to generate a searchable text equivalent. The efficacy of text-recognition processes varies considerably. Key terms like “university” may be converted to “un1versily” or a range of other anomalous variants. The older the legislation, the poorer the print quality, the less efficient the text-recognition process, and the less reliable any keyword searches. Further, the inefficiency of the AustLII database search engine failed to identify legislation identified through other protocols. To manage deficiencies in keyword search functionality, different approaches were taken for each legislature and were iteratively refined as familiarity with the legislature, legislation and idiosyncrasies of the AustLII database matured.

A keyword search was undertaken for the discrete AustLII database of Acts relevant to each jurisdiction for keywords of “university”, “college”, “research”, “education” and “scholarship”. This identified some but not all of the financing legislation relevant to higher education. This also generated results irrelevant to the dissertation. For example, Acts referencing the appointment of university personnel to statutory boards involved in the regulation of professions were returned in keyword searches for “university”, but they have no direct bearing on university finances. These and other Acts were excluded from analysis.

Each year for which historic Acts in each jurisdiction were passed and aggregated in the AustLII database were examined to identify Acts relevant to universities and higher education. This included keyword searches for relevant terminology in the titles of Acts, including “university”, “college”, “research”, “education” and “scholarship”. This approach also faced limitations, with some legislation relating to research or education; for example, spanning non-university or higher education purposes, such as market research or school education.

University financing was also found to be embedded within legislation seemingly irrelevant to higher education. For example, legislation with a focus on public works can make provision for purchase of land for universities or university-specific building works that would not be captured by searches of the title of legislation, and may not be captured in keyword searches given the limitations of the OCR process and AustLII search function. Cross-references made to legislation in Acts identified as in the scope for analysis were also useful for identifying relevant legislation.

In addition to keyword searches of the database and annual legislation indexes, keyword searches were also undertaken of Appropriation and Supply Acts. These have also proven to be important mechanisms in which the financing of higher education is explicitly described in legislation within some jurisdictions. Keyword searches were systematically made to Appropriation and Supply Acts, again with the caveat that the efficiency of OCR processes limit the effectiveness of a keyword search, particularly on older and lower-quality print Appropriation Acts.

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Jurisdictional Considerations

The identification of legislation was undertaken on a state-by-state basis, with data organised by state legislature. This is relevant to the first research question and the relevance of jurisdictions to financing legislation. Difference by jurisdiction, and the extent to which common themes could be identified across legislatures and across time, were pursued through an inductive qualitative research process. The 322 distinct items meeting the definition of legislation between 1850 to 1950 were categorised by the form of legislation (e.g. university Act, Appropriation Act), the financing mechanism utilised within the Act (e.g. endowment, specific time-bound appropriation), the implied purpose of appropriation (e.g. to fund a discipline, scholarships or university infrastructure), and the composition of legislation (e.g. number of pages, number of items financed). This categorisation is described in more detail below. Pivotal transition points emerging from observations were subject to more detailed analysis of the broader policy cycle to better understand features of the specific text included within legislation, and the underlying intent of the legislation. Legislation identified was initially positioned into three broad categories:

1. University (and Higher Education Institution) Specific Acts

University (and higher education institution) Acts are those whose primary purpose is to direct funds towards higher education institutional purposes. This is commonly observed throughout foundation, in the “university Act”, but also in Acts that enable stand-alone legislative allocation of funds to universities independent of the university Act. HEFA and HESA fall within this category in the post-Dawkins era, as do the States Grants (Universities) Acts that operated from the 1950s to 1970s as the Commonwealth progressively played a stronger role in the system.

Every university established during the foundational era included provision for future annual allocations of funding, and the university Act can be considered both an Act of establishment and a financing instrument. Over time, the embedding of an endowment within university Acts was withdrawn.

University (and higher education institution) Acts also include legislation that amends the university Act but which have no material effect on financing of the university or universities. This includes legislation that introduces minor changes to governance of the university in the case of the foundational era, or minor changes to provisions within HESA. By virtue of the university Act being a financing mechanism, Acts that amend the university Act but have no material impact on financing were within the scope for analysis.

2. Acts Funding University and Other Purposes

Acts funding universities and other purposes direct funding to universities (and higher education institutions) as part of their funding of multiple purposes that extend beyond higher education. For example, legislation that established scholarships for students to engage in education – both across schools and universities – are categorised as Acts funding universities and other purposes. This is distinct from legislation that amends university Acts to embed scholarships in university operations. Within this categorisation, some financing may flow to the university, but without a singular university focus or intent. Universities and other purposes Acts also include legislation targeting broad policy objectives, such as agricultural

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education or science and industrial research, which includes direct funding for universities as one of multiple recipients of funding.

3. Whole-of-Government Appropriation Acts

Appropriation (and Supply) Acts support whole-of-government activity that in some jurisdictions, and in some years, make specific provision for financing for higher education. In many years, the quantum of additional funding listed in these Appropriation Acts dwarfs the public funding specifically endowed or directed to higher education institutions within the category of university Acts. Additional appropriations take on many forms; in some cases providing highly targeted and detailed descriptions of what the additional appropriation is directed towards, and in other cases a more general statement of “additional endowment”.

In many cases, and in some jurisdictions, appropriations for higher education are contained within a general appropriation for the relevant government department, for which no reference to higher education can be made. It is clear from other reference points, including university annual reports and Australian Bureau of Statistics Year Books, that government funding is being directed to universities in these jurisdictions in these years but without explicit reference to higher education in relevant Appropriation Acts. The absence of specific reference to higher education makes Appropriation Acts of this type beyond the scope of analysis for inclusion within the research design.

Adaptive Pressures

Legislation was examined to understand the extent to which environmental factors exerting adaptive pressure on higher education financing were embedded within financing legislation. Legislation was reviewed for references to the “Sequoia Trinity” of disciplinary considerations (Burton Clark), institutional and university considerations (Clark Kerr) and social and economic drivers (Martin Trow). This was extended to global considerations (Simon Marginson).

It is worth noting that given the complexity of some legislation, each of these categories of explanation may be evident in specific sections of legislation. Elements of the legalisation may introduce major changes that relate to disciplines, the university and broader social and economic issues simultaneously. Using the genetic metaphor for this study, the broad Act may be considered chromosomal, with specific genes embedded within. Different genes may change at different rates and for different underlying reasons. Each item of legislation was examined for the presence of each of these explanations using specific criteria, as described in Table 2 below.

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Table 2. Financing Legislation Categorisation Criteria

Explanation Indicative Inclusion Criteria

Environmental Changes

Response to internalist academic considerations, the uses of the university and/or social and/or economic factors

• Introduction of a new financing mechanism, such as university Act or substantive University and Other Purposes Act

• Material and substantive change to design of an existing financing mechanism

• Specific appropriation for a new higher education-related activity within the jurisdiction

• Material change in appropriation for specific appropriation relative to whole-of-government expenditure and/or university income

Academic Work

• Establishment of new discipline • Initial investment in discipline-specific facilities

(university as collection of disciplines)

Institution

• Substantial rewrite of university Act (university as administrative rules)

• Construction of new buildings (university as physical space)

Social and Economic

• Clarification or refinement of policy rules responding to social movements such as gender

• New scholarships targeting contemporaneous understandings of disadvantage

• Proliferation of sites of delivery (university as a response to social context)

• Investment in specific economic development activities (university as a response to economic need)

Global Higher Education Developments

• References to international reference points within legislation, such as degrees that are recognised or can be awarded

• References to global developments in minister’s second reading speech as a key point of policy cycle (university as part of a global knowledge system)

In addition to categorising foundational era legislation by its specificity, impact and intent, attention was also directed to the specific details of legislation. The foundational era provides an opportunity to provide proof of concept to analytic techniques utilised more extensively in later chapters, specifically how legislation is positioned within the policy cycle, and how changes to the specific text of legislation can be tracked across time.

The policy cycle for the establishment of the University of Sydney and University of Melbourne are contrasted, drawing upon various data sources to validate and challenge dominant narratives in the literature about the foundational era of Australian higher education. This includes analysis of the distinct legislative approach to how these institutions were established and key stages of the policy cycle. This allows inferences to be made about the relationship between universities and their broader social context. This approach is extended to other

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universities and other developments across financing legislation, with primary reference to the purposes or objects articulated in select Acts.

This comparative approach is consistent with positioning the text of financing legislation as “genetic material” that is conserved, deleted or mutated with subsequent amendments. A specific tool (CopyLeaks13) was utilised to aid in text matching – to trace the degree of conservation, or path dependency, or mutation, of legislative text. CopyLeaks is a publicly available variant of plagiarism software (others include Turn It In) designed to identify instances where text in one document is similar to another. The algorithms within CopyLeaks provide a convenient mechanism for quantifying the overall similarity between documents and highlights text that is similar and different between documents. This is useful for clarifying convergence across legislative change without manually tracking the impact of each amendment. The use of CopyLeaks places an analytical tool in the hands of a software provider, rather than the researcher. An alternative approach may have been to manually undertake comparative analysis of relevant text, but it was found to be time-consuming, error prone and difficult to quantify the changes with consistency, particularly in large and complex legislative documents.

Some studies of policy text have adopted technologies and frameworks of the biological sciences, particularly genomic analysis.14 The intent of this study is not one of examining large volumes of policy reference points for instances or broad patterns of “text reuse”. Rather, this study seeks to isolate significant text instances and trace their conservation and mutation across time, in specifically targeted pieces of legislation, and contextualised by artefacts produced by the policy cycle. The SW Algorithm may assist with this process on a scale with well-structured and accurate searchable text documents. This makes it unsuited to the foundational era, given the quality of searchable text. CopyLeaks served as an expedient mechanism for facilitating this process, signalling similarities and differences that were then reviewed using the informed judgement of the researcher.

Whilst the bulk of the foundational era is concerned with patterns of financing legislation across jurisdictions, there is an inevitable requirement to juxtapose patterns of legislation with patterns of financing. University financial reports and Australian Bureau of Statistics Year Books were utilised to compare university financing, extending the analysis from legislation to the financing the legislation enables.

Together, through identifying financing legislation – categorising the form, intent and impact of this legislation; positioning the legislation within the policy cycle; and comparing and contrasting the legislation across jurisdictions – the insights from applying a conceptual model of the heredity of the foundational era of Australian higher education emerge.

Commonwealth Financing Legislation, 1951 to 1988

The century of legislation examined in the foundational era of Australian higher education provides a multijurisdictional opportunity to identify patterns in higher education financing. These patterns potentially reveal insights into the heredity of higher education financing legislation that are more difficult to identify in the single n=1 jurisdiction of the Commonwealth. Any state-based generalisable insights need to be tested for validity within a different jurisdiction and/or different period. The onset and maturation of Commonwealth

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involvement provides an opportunity to assess which of the approaches to, and patterns evident in, financing evident across the colonies, states and territories have come to pass.

The reduction in scope involved in considering the single legislature of the Commonwealth provides an opportunity to identify relevant higher education financing legislation; categorise the form, intent and impact of this legislation; and position the legislation within the policymaking process. The narrowing of legislatures under consideration allows for greater depth of analysis into higher education financing legislation. However, this potential remains tempered by the sheer volume of legislation relating to higher education passed over the timeframes in question, and the ever-increasing volume of legislative text that is generated. This timeframe coincides with major changes evident from social, economic, political and higher education sector perspectives. Whilst more focused analysis can be achieved in this single jurisdiction, the complexity of factors influencing higher education financing legislation places limitations on the types of knowledge claims that can be made through this research.

The process of identifying relevant legislation made by the Commonwealth follows those methods applied in the foundational era. AustLII remains the repository in which legislation is primarily identified, although the Commonwealth’s Federal Register of Legislation15 was also utilised. Post 1951, challenges of identifying relevant legislation are reduced considerably as better-quality printed materials generate more reliable and accurate searchable PDF documents, eventually transitioning to plain text searchable versions of the legislation around the mid-1970s. The systematic approach to identifying legislation described earlier, whilst laborious, remains useful for identifying relevant legislation that may be missed if reliant only on keyword searches of the database or year-by-year legislative title alone. This is particularly relevant for Amendment Acts to existing financing legislation that may not be identified in title or keyword searches for the term “university” and other analogous terms.

After identifying legislation as relevant to university financing legislation, each item was then subject to a similar protocol described in the foundational era and was reviewed for the relevance of environmental factors described in Table 2. The volume of legislation under consideration again imposes constraints on the extent to which every artefact of every policy cycle for every piece of financing legislation can be examined. However, through a reflexive approach framed by the propositions already outlined, and refined in the foundational era analysis, the legislation and policymaking processes that warrant greater scrutiny were isolated with valid justification. The combination of theory-informed categorisation of legislation, and targeted assessment of relevant artefacts evident in policy cycles, allows for the research questions to be explored without being overwhelmed by the underlying complexity of relevant data.

Unified National System – The Higher Education Funding and Higher Education Support Acts

Key legislation post the introduction of the unified national system – HEFA and HESA – is treated differently to that in the foundational era and earlier phases of Commonwealth financing legislation. Propositions that emerge from analysis of legislation described in previous sections – particularly relating to increasing legislative complexity and reduced frequency by which new financing mechanisms are created – are exemplified in the post-Dawkins era. To illustrate, the States Grants (Universities) Act 1951 spans five pages, and HESA in 2020 spans over 500 pages. The enactment and subsequent amendments to HEFA highlight and affirm propositions emerging from analysis of earlier legislation at a macro level. The

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ostensible replacement of HEFA with HESA is itself a demonstration of a key feature that emerges from application of the heredity model. The methodology shifts from identifying any higher education financing legislation across a specified timeframe to one of identifying amendments to a specific form of higher education financing legislation and how patterns evident in these amendments align to trends identified at earlier points in time.

At the micro level of the precise formulation of administrative rules codified in HESA, a more focused policy case study approach is adopted. Core features and sections of the legislation as both individual components and holistic interdependent features are isolated. Relevant sections of HESA are then subject to analysis that traces the lineage of amendments that have produced the specific wording present in the 2019 compilation of HESA. The lineage is traced by searching for the specific phrasing utilised in various sections within each amendment to HEFA and HESA. This allows for each relevant amendment to be identified and associated to the Act in place in 2019.

At each point at which a relevant amendment is identified, the policy cycle relevant to the amendment is scrutinised in detail. The policy cycle encompasses the policymaking process involved in the amendment. Information relevant to the policymaking process includes:

• The bill as first introduced that led to the amendment, highlighting the government’s proposed changes to the legislation.

• The second reading speech of the relevant minister or member of parliament outlining the purposes of and intentions of the bill.

• Any amendments to the bill introduced by either the House of Representatives or the Senate.

• Hansard debates of the bill within both the House of Representatives and the Senate. • Parliamentary documents and reports relating to the bill, including Regulatory Impact

Statements, and Committee Reports. Any submissions to any committee inquiries into the bill were also examined.

• Where available and discoverable, Cabinet papers relating to the amendment were also reviewed.

ORGANISATION OF RESEARCH FINDINGS

This chapter concludes where it begins, and with the recognition that the understanding of the complexity of higher education systems is an enormous challenge for this fledgling researcher, particularly when considering the breadth and complexity of data that it seeks to draw upon. The research addresses a topic that much scholarship positions as a peripheral reference point in a more important and broader social process. The exciting potential of this research is that it may identify novel insights through navigating a road less travelled. The terrifying potential of this research is that it must invent new ways and means of navigating this terrain without the lane markings, wayfinding signs and methodological road laws that ensure safe passage. Nonetheless, through a clear theoretical position, a theory-informed approach to data gathering and analysis, and an inductive approach to making sense of the data, insights have been generated that have proven satisfying for the researcher. Initial engagement with more experienced scholars suggests the results are of interest but must be presented with carefully framed caveats around the validity of knowledge claims.

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Subsequent chapters examine the relevance of jurisdiction, the nature of and adaptive pressures giving rise to complexity, and the problems associated with how this complexity is embedded in financing legislation. Neither of these findings are groundbreaking or novel, and there is much literature that will align with individual findings. What is distinctive, however, is the assemblage of findings, and subtle features that emerge from seeking to define heredity through analysis of legislation and the integrated higher education and public policy cycle.

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1 Burton Clark, On higher education: Selected writings, 1956–2006 (Johns Hopkins University Press, 2008), I.

2 Michael Waring, Finding your theoretical position. Research methods and methodologies in education (Sage, London, 2012), 15–19.

3 Australian Legal Information Institute, www.austlii.edu.au

4 Daniel. T. Layzell, “State higher education funding models: An assessment of current and emerging approaches,” Journal of Education Finance, 33, no. 1 (2007): 1–19.

5 See: Lynn V Meek, “The transformation of Australian higher education from binary to unitary system,” Higher Education, 21, no. 4, (1991): 461–494.; and Trevor Gale and Deb Tranter, “Social justice in Australian higher education policy: An historical and conceptual account of student participation,” Critical Studies in Education, 52, no. 1(2011), 29–46.

6 John W. Creswell. Research design: Qualitative and mixed methods approaches (London and Thousand Oaks: Sage Publications, 2009),

7 Anthony Biglan, “The characteristics of subject matter in different academic areas,” Journal of Applied Psychology, 57, no. 3 (1973): 195–203.

8 Creswell. Research design: Qualitative and mixed methods approaches

9 Stijn Daenekindt and Jeroen Huisman, "Mapping the scattered field of research on higher education. A correlated topic model of 17,000 articles, 1991–2018," Higher Education 80, (2020): 1-17.

10 Creswell. Research design: Qualitative and mixed methods approaches, 10.

11 To illustrate, the La Trobe University Act 1964 (Vic) s.32. includes a fixed endowment of £250,00 per annum at point of establishment. The endowment is eventually repealed in the Financial Management (Consequential Amendments) Act 1994 (Vic) Schedule 1.s38. By contrast, the Deakin University Act 1974 (Vic) includes no fixed endowment.

12 Department of Education and Training, Finance 2016: Financial Reports of Higher Education Providers. Published 24 January 2018, https://docs.education.gov.au/node/47911. Highlight that 64% of Australian Government Grants arises from the Commonwealth Grants Scheme and teaching.

13 CopyLeaks compare document tool: www.copyleaks.com/compare

14 The use of the Smith-Waterman local alignment algorithm to match text in policy documents has been pioneered by: John Wilkerson, David Smith, and Nicholas Stramp, "Tracing the flow of policy ideas in legislatures: A text reuse approach," American Journal of Political Science 59, no. 4 (2015): 943-956.; and, Fridolin Linder, et al, "Text as policy: Measuring policy similarity through bill text reuse," Policy Studies Journal, 48, no. 2 (2020): 546-574.

15 Australian Government, Federal Register of Legislation, retrieved 1 October 2020, www.legislation.gov.au.

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CHAPTER FIVE: HEREDITY AND JURISDICTIONS

If I have read this story correctly, at each step along the way, until recently, the changes in funding and governance have seemed to be on favourable terms: they have involved liberation from the uncertainties of the market, from the inequities and moral dilemmas of student fees; freedom from the variable and increasingly onerous supervision of State authorities; and above all, more money at each point along the way. But rather suddenly Australian universities seem to find themselves in the hands of a national government not wholly sympathetic to its concerns, and with a conception of the proper relationship between central government and the universities that differs from that held by at least some university people.

Martin Trow (1983). Defining the issues in university-government relations: An international perspective.1

Chapters One to Four have introduced the idea of heredity. A legislation-based model of heredity is put forward as a means of describing the passage of inherited characteristics across time, and for explaining the high frequency with which financing legislation is passed in Australia. The heredity model involves a higher education-specific elaboration of the policy cycle with four key components: the public policy process; the higher education financing legislation generated through this policy process; the higher education activity enabled by this legislation; and the broader social context, which is both influenced by higher education and which exerts influence over public policy processes. This chapter describes findings relating to the jurisdictions within which these policy cycles reside, with particular attention on the origins of universities and financing mechanisms.

The concept of heredity of higher education was first articulated by Eric Ashby whilst speaking at a conference in Michigan2. The speech found its way into print by way of conference proceedings, and the Journal of Higher Education.3 Martin Trow also toyed with the idea of heredity, citing Ashby in musings about the future of American higher education.4 In 1983, Trow was invited to speak at a Conference of University Governing Bodies, sponsored by the Australian Vice-Chancellors’ Committee. Trow’s address critically reviewed Australian higher education policy through the prism of university and government relations. This address, similar to Ashby’s, first found its way into print as an occasional paper at the Centre for Studies of Higher Education, University of California, Berkeley, and then in the journal Studies in Higher Education. Trow’s framing of the nexus between universities and the government makes for an Australian-specific launching pad to explore the importance of governments in shaping the inherited characteristics of Australian universities.

Trow’s 1983 analysis of Australian higher education was predicated on a context in which state constitutional responsibilities for higher education had been formally referred to the Commonwealth for a decade. One might question in this context what relevance “jurisdictions” in the plural might have to our notion of heredity, given higher education has been dominated by a single jurisdiction for nearly 50 years. Analysis of legislation evident across colonies and states increases the sample size of jurisdictions from one to many, and the relevance of jurisdictions from the point of origin and their early evolution. This analysis spans the foundational era of higher education from 1850 to the Commonwealth’s more formal

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system involvement with the States Grants (Universities) Act 1951; the pre-cursor of single jurisdiction control of universities.

THE HIGHER EDUCATION PUBLIC POLICY CYCLE: GENESIS AND EARLY EVOLUTION The University of Sydney, 1850

The genesis of Australian higher education is marked by the establishment of the University of Sydney in 1850.5 The people of a rudimentary democratic legislature spoke, and the void of localised university delivery of higher education was filled. Prior to this, any person aspiring to undertake university study had no choice but to make an arduous journey to the other side of the world.

The passing of the University of Sydney Act 1850 was the culmination of a policy process that began in 1849. One can look further back in time to identify references to universities and their role in colonial life, but they are less clearly connected to the genesis of Australian higher education. Specific reference to universities were made within debate on public education in the legislative council of 1844,6 and in legislation regulating specific public services.7 These references are not central to the establishment of the University of Sydney, but do highlight that the idea of the university was not irrelevant at this point in colonial life. The idea of the university was a more enduring, high-quality solution to the needs of colonial life than the troubled Australia and Sydney Colleges.8

The policymaking conventions of the Westminster system of government, and presence of a policy cycle, were evident in the university’s establishment process. A member of legislative council petitioned for a Select Committee to consider the higher education needs of New South Wales.9 Subsequent debate approved the petition, although with specific edits to the text. Reference to the Sydney College were excised through this process. Several members had interests in Sydney College, and the impartiality of those involved in the Committee was to be achieved by a ballot.10 The Select Committee reported back on 21 September,11 and by 28 September leave was granted to introduce a Bill to Incorporate and Endow a University to be called The University of Sydney12. This Bill had its first reading on 2 October.13 A petition was received from surgeons and physicians that sought to reserve a place on the university’s Senate.14 Council was, however, prorogued, and the Bill lapsed until reintroduction in 1850.

The Select Committee prepared its report without consultation, in part due to the time constraints, and in part to avoid “sectarian controversies”.15 Sectarian and other stakeholder interests were mobilised following the reintroduction of the Bill. Multiple petitions praying certain modifications to the Bill were received, including from members of the clergy, professors of Australia College, and inhabitants from several communities near (Sydney) and far (Bathurst, Newcastle and Berrima).16 Governor Charles Augustus FitzRoy was also active in the policy cycle:

The Governor recommends to the Council the insertion in the Bill for incorporating and endowing a University, to be called the University of Sydney, a clause permanently appropriating the sum of £5,000 a year, from the General Revenue, as a fund for Salaries, a Library, and other necessary annual expenses of such University.17

The inclusion of a permanent endowment within the University of Sydney Act 1850 makes this the first piece of higher education financing legislation to be enacted in what is now Australia.

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This legislation can be understood as the product of a public policy cycle that was entwined with the interests of the broader social context. This legislation then enabled and contributed to an evolving policy context and a range of higher education activities that span 1850 to the current day. This is not a particularly groundbreaking finding, but it is worth contrasting with the proposition put forward in the National report on Australia’s higher education sector,18 which suggested that prior to World War II higher education was remote from the concerns of the vast majority of the population.

The volume of historically oriented work that explores Australian higher education across its first century, the relative absence of such literature from the National report on Australia’s higher education sector or policy-oriented work that cites this report is illustrative of underlying challenges in public policy. There is considerable knowledge that might be relevant to policy decisions, and finite processing resources to integrate this knowledge. An espoused commitment to evidence-based rapidly confronts a bounded rationality19. In the case of the University of Sydney there is a wide array of historical literature that might inform public policy processes, although not widely cited beyond the discipline. This literature includes that exploring the social contract informing the origins of higher education in its formative years,20 and role of government.21 The university and its community,22 is another describes the emerging pattern of relationship between the university and community. This analysis also suggests that Australians (or Her Majesty’s subjects of the colonies, as they were at the time) expected much from their university.

The establishment of the University of Sydney represents clear evidence in response to the first research question posed, specifically that financing legislation is influenced by the legislative and policy content from which the legislation is passed. The University of Sydney, and subsequent institutions, have been established through imaginings of what universities can do to create a better world. Australian universities have been shaped by and serve community expectations, mediated by a public policy process. The petitions received by the New South Wales Legislative Council demonstrated the hopes of a growing population about what an Australian university could be, and indeed what Australia could be. The Sydney University Act 1850 was passed within days of a resolution to cease penal transportation. The social and political tranquillity asserted through abolition of transportation complimented an aspirational vision for a society enriched by the advancement of knowledge.

With a datapoint of one it is too early to make comments in response to the second research question and patterns that may be evident across jurisdictions and history. There is enough within this single datapoint to consider the third research question and the extent to which disciplines, the institution, broader society and references to global developments in higher education are encoded as environmental influences within legislation. Select text from the University of Sydney Act 1850 relevant to heredity research questions is described in Table 3.

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Table 3. Claims About Heredity Embedded in the University of Sydney Act 1850

Heredity Claims: University of Sydney Act 1850

University legislation is financing legislation, making it a legitimate reference point to the study of heredity.

The university is then entwined in subsequent policy processes as state, private and other revenue streams are amended and adjusted.

And be it enacted That by way of permanent endowment for the said University … the sum of five thousand pounds in each and every year (s.3)

That it shall be lawful … to demand and receive from the Students of the said University, such reasonable fees for attendance on their Lectures, and … such reasonable fees for entrance degrees (s.17)

Financing legislation and the perpetual nature of the Body Politic and Corporate provides a basis for the transmission of inherited characteristics.

Senate shall be and is hereby constituted from the date of such nomination and appointment, a Body Politic and Corporate (preamble)

Disciplines and forms of academic work are embedded in financing legislation.

That the said Senate shall have power after examination to confer the several degrees of Bachelor of Arts, … Bachelor of Laws, … Bachelor of Medicine and Doctor of Medicine and to examine for Medical Degrees in the four branches of Medicine, Surgery, Midwifery, and Pharmacy (s.13)

Linkages to broader society are embedded in financing legislation.

Whereas it is deemed expedient for the better advancement of religion and morality and the promotion of useful knowledge … an encouragement for pursuing a regular and liberal course of education. (preamble)

To hold forth to all classes and denominations of Her Majesty’s subjects resident in the Colony of New South Wales, without any distinction whatsoever … And be it enacted that no religious test shall be administered (preamble)

Linkages to global developments are embedded in financing legislation.

Senate shall from time to time report to the Governor and Executive Council for the time being of the said Colony what appear to them to be the medical institutions and schools whether corporate or unincorporated in the City of Sydney from which either singly or jointly with other medical institutions and schools in the said Colony or in Foreign parts it may be fit and expedient in the judgment of the said Senate to admit candidates for medical degrees (s.12)

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As Table 3 highlights, university legislation embeds a financing component that defines it as financing legislation. In doing so, it entwines the institution in the nexus between the public policy process and higher education activity. There is a perpetual basis to the institution that legitimises the conceptual underpinnings of the heredity model. The legislation also defines the types of activity that can be undertaken that can then influence future policy cycles. References to disciplines, the institution, broader social expectations and demands, and even global developments can be found in the University of Sydney legislation at its point of origin.

This institution has been depicted as the starting point for a path dependency that all other Australian universities have followed. Subsequent sections examine how the university’s enabling legislation then evolved across time, and how it interacted with other items of financing legislation within New South Wales and other jurisdictions. Subsequent chapters will explore this evolution in greater detail, but it is worth noting that the model of heredity is active and evident soon after the University of Sydney’s establishment.

In 1852, the University of Sydney Act was amended and the “genetic code” and administrative rules of the university began to mutate.23 This 1852 Act is ostensibly a minor change to governance, providing clarity on how to deal with a “Member of the Senate who absents himself from the Colony for a certain period”.24 In more abstract terms, this can be interpreted as a failure of original drafting to conceive of the problems of specifying an unduly large quorum. This itself is a form of bounded rationality. In 1853, two Acts were passed that allowed the University of Sydney to buy Sydney College25 and to appropriate funds towards the building of Sydney University.26 The nexus between higher education and public policy processes produces and amends legislation, and subsequent evolution of the genetic code embedded in legislative text shapes the heredity of Australian higher education.

The University of Melbourne, 1853

The University of Melbourne was also the product of a Select Committee and modelled itself on the University of Sydney.27 An Act to incorporate and endow the University of Melbourne28 was assented to on 22 January 1853, and provides a reference point to the question as to whether universities of the foundational era were mere replicants of earlier instances or unique functions of their own state legislatures. Forming a judgement on this particular issue is much dependent on one’s vantage point and basis of analysis. The broad influences of universities of England and Scotland are documented and evident.29 One could take a thematic view as to the broad range of activities and functions and see parallels between the level of financing and types of activities that were present within these founding Acts. One could also adopt a narrower genetic analysis to assess similarities and differences in the number and sequence of letters and words. Each approach is valid, and a model of heredity should be able to coherently integrate micro, meso and macro perspectives.

The micro perspective reveals not insignificant differences in how the two jurisdictions went about establishing universities. The University of Sydney Act had over 3,000 words, whilst the University of Melbourne Act was around one-third smaller, with a word count of around 1,900 words. Around one-third of the text from the University of Sydney Act is evident in the University of Melbourne Act. This is, however, just an estimate as automated tools are hamstrung by the efficiency and effectiveness of OCR on PDF source documents and features

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of the underlying text-matching algorithm utilised. A detailed text comparison of both Acts in their entirety is neither necessary nor productive for assessing the comparability of these and hundreds of other Acts across the foundational era. However, targeted assessment (Table 4) demonstrates significant similarities in underlying policy intent, with evidence of legislative text reuse and localised customisation.

Table 4. Comparison of Heredity Claims Between the University of Sydney Act 1850 and the University of Melbourne Act 1853

Heredity Claims: University of Sydney Act 1850 University of Melbourne Act 1853

University legislation is financing legislation.

And be it enacted That by way of permanent endowment for the said University … the sum of five thousand pounds in each and every year

It shall be lawful for … and paid out of the General Revenue the sum of Nine Thousand Pounds in every year as a fund for maintaining the said University (s.XIII)

Financing legislation has perpetual characteristics.

Senate shall be and is hereby constituted from the date of such nomination and appointment, a Body Politic and Corporate

An University consisting of a Council and Senate shall be established at Melbourne and when duly constituted and appointed according to the provisions of this Act shall be a Body Politic and Corporate (s.I)

Disciplines and forms of academic work are embedded in financing legislation.

That the said Senate shall have power after examination to confer the several degrees of Bachelor of Arts, … Bachelor of Laws, … Bachelor of Medicine … and to examine for Medical Degrees in the four branches of Medicine, Surgery, Midwifery, and Pharmacy,

The said Council shall have power to confer after examination the several degrees of Bachelor of Arts … Bachelor of Medicine … Bachelor of Laws … Bachelor of Music (s.X)

Financing legislation serves broader social purposes.

Whereas it is deemed expedient for the better advancement of religion and morality and the promotion of useful knowledge

…to hold forth to all classes and denominations of Her Majesty’s subjects

… No Religious Test shall be administered

WHEREAS it is expedient to promote sound learning in the Colony of Victoria

…open to all classes and denominations of Her Majesty’s subjects (preamble)

… No Religious Test shall be administered (s. XII)

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Heredity Claims: University of Sydney Act 1850 University of Melbourne Act 1853

Linkages to global developments are embedded in financing legislation.

… medical institutions and schools in the said Colony or in Foreign parts

No references to global developments identified

Potential system-wide insights arising from comparative analysis of the two university Acts of establishment is that a defining characteristic of the Australian university is its legislative creation as a Body Politic and Corporate. The distinction between the Australian body-politic-university and earlier institutional forms is described by Orr.30 The importance of the body politic is that it is has:

… perpetual succession, meaning eternal life, and exist separate from its governing body or members.31

The university is literally larger than life; it transcends its membership and residents of the communities it serves. Short shrift is generally given to the notion of the body politic, and its role in university affairs. Indeed, the very notion of a body politic might be considered “an anomaly in the face of corporate and public-policy realities”.32

One should be cautious of over-emphasising perpetual succession as a unique feature of universities. The bedrock of corporate institutions and governance is the incorporated company limited by guarantee. The company is separate from owners, directors and officers, and has perpetual succession.33 Incorporated businesses and associations clearly come and go. Calls for institutional mergers arise from time to time, including in the contemporary policy climate.34 These calls give insufficient attention to the perpetual nature of institutions and what this might mean for the practicalities of any merger process. Universities have proven to be distinctively resilient to adapt and survive. Many organisations established under similar expectations of perpetual succession are now moribund.

One matter of trivia worth highlighting in comparisons between Sydney and Melbourne is that both Acts include the term “hereditament”,35 allowing these institutions to inherit buildings and rent. One thing that has not been inherited is the use of the term. Neither the University of Sydney nor Melbourne Acts now include this concept.

Relevant to financing is that both universities adopted a shared financial responsibility for students and the state, but there were differences in the initial size of annual endowment. The difference of £4,000 per annum may be small by contemporary terms, but when viewed in cumulative terms is significant for the development of both institutions. The University of Sydney endowment was not increased until 1902,36 and only then increased to £10,000 per annum. Additional appropriations between 1849 and 190237 levelled the playing field somewhat but could not be relied upon in the same way as a guaranteed endowment.

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Building the Universities of Sydney and Melbourne, 1853 to 1856

There are similarities and differences in how the universities of Sydney and Melbourne came about and were brought into existence through a public policy process. The jurisdictional similarities and differences in university establishment are revealed with near-perfect symmetry in public funding for university buildings. In both instances, £45,000 was allocated close to the point of establishment for university buildings. At the University of Sydney this was achieved through a specific Act of the Legislative Council,38 whilst at the University of Melbourne this was achieved through specific clauses within whole-of-government Appropriation Acts spanning 1854, 1855 and 1856.39 In the case of the University of Sydney, the Act stipulated that:

In addition to £5,000 votes this session towards a building Fund for the University, £45,000 more shall be paid by instalments of not exceeding £10,000 nor under £5,000 yearly.

For the case of the University of Melbourne Appropriation Acts:

Out of the Monies disposable by the said Legislative Council there shall and may be appropriated …

Ten thousand pounds towards building an University Melbourne (1854)

… any sum or sums of money not exceeding Twenty-five thousand pounds as a third grant for the erection of the University (1855)

… sum or sums of money not exceeding Ten thousand pounds to complete the north side of the University Building (1856)

The differences in approach highlight that there are additional forms of financing legislation to be considered in analysis of higher education financing beyond university Acts. In addition to fixed endowments of university Acts, there is legislation that specifically directs funds towards university purposes, which may be explicitly focused on university appropriations, as with the Sydney University Act 185340. Whole-of-government Appropriation Acts are also utilised that include specific appropriations for universities and higher education.

At both institutions, the mechanism adopted by the jurisdiction to allocate funding is different, but the £45,000 outcome is identical. For the University of Sydney there was an annual allocation made towards the building of the university. The next legislated change to financing was in 1874, with university-related expenditure described in a whole-of-government Appropriation Act. At Melbourne, on the other hand, specific appropriations were made in whole-of-government Appropriation Acts for eight of the next 10 years, spanning 1854 to 1864. The allocation of funds for building the university in these early years was not without dissent, with moves to strike out the £10,000 to complete the north side of the university negatived following debate.41

This foundational investment resulted in “Scottish ecclesiastical stonework” and “exuberant gothic revival” buildings.42 Whilst the foundational era can be trivialised to tweet like brevity and irrelevance in many texts, this early investment in infrastructure is often the centrepiece

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of university branding and marketing materials. History and prestige signalled by these heritage university buildings can confer long-term competitive advantage.

Scholarships and the University of Tasmania, 1858 to 1889

Tasmania took a different route from New South Wales and Victoria, although eventually joined the existing path. Higher education was first financed by provision of scholarships.43 These scholarships funded individuals rather than the institution, which represented a distinct jurisdictional change of approach to supporting higher education. This scholarship program was small and targeted. In what might be the most selective item of all Australian higher education legislation observed in this study, the Scholarship Act was amended in 1882 to provide an additional scholarship to the third person on the list of eligible candidates.44 Charles Seymour Dowdell was awarded £800 over four years to undertake studies in Britain.

The three scholarships awarded in 1882 can be contrasted with the 868 students who were full-time candidates for examinations at the University of Melbourne at the time.45 Even at this small scale, however, Tasmania’s financing legislation demonstrated the legislature’s responsiveness to social needs and expectations. Scholarships were extended to both sexes in 187146 (a decade before similar developments in Victoria47 and New South Wales48). Age requirements for scholarships were varied in 1879.49 The propensity to support students studying across Australia and overseas may explain the slow future evolution of the University of Tasmania post establishment in 1889.

In what might be considered the first recognition of an “Australian system of higher education”, the Scholarship Act was amended in 1887 to support participation in any university in the Australian colonies, not just universities of the United Kingdom. 50 The relevance of Tasmania to the origins of a national system were also evident in 1925 with the Appropriation Act outlining co-contributions to a Chair of Anthropology at the University of Sydney51. The conventional narrative of Commonwealth coordination of the system included commentary around advancing the role of research, technology and science following the Great War52 and World War II.53 National coordinated investment in anthropology in a time of peace was difficult to reconcile with these narratives.

Tasmania established a university of its own making in 1889. The earlier Scholarship Act venerated the British higher education model, aiming for the “Youth of the Colony” to benefit from the United Kingdom’s advanced state of “mental culture” through a “regular and liberal course of education”.54 Tasmania faced a choice in legal drafting between continuing its own scholarship tradition, or adopting text from the universities of Melbourne, Sydney or Adelaide. The Sydney model apparently prevailed, and the Scholarship Act was repealed. Whilst there is less concern for morality and religiosity, the Tasmanian University Act derives its purposes verbatim from the University of Sydney, and with it a focus on “useful knowledge” rather than Melbourne’s “sound learning”:

WHEREAS it is deemed expedient, for the promotion of useful knowledge, to hold forth to all classes of Her Majesty’s subjects resident in Tasmania, without any distinction whatsoever, encouragement for pursuing a regular and liberal course of Education by the establishment of a University.55

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Despite emulating the University of Sydney, Tasmania does not merely cut and paste between Acts, and distinctive features are evident that do not arise in New South Wales or Victoria. The University of Tasmania, from its inception, is entwined with technical education. Whilst empowered to confer degrees in arts, science, law, medicine and music, the university is also empowered to make statutes with colleges or schools connected with technical education. A regular and liberal course of education is combined with practical and technical concerns. Beyond a cut and paste of purposes, the text of the University of Tasmania Act is for the most part unique and cannot be seen as a path dependency locked-in by the University of Sydney.

Tasmanian higher education highlights the importance of jurisdiction to heredity. The initial product of the public policy cycle is scholarships rather than an institution. The iterative refinement of scholarships legislation reveals a responsiveness to social interests (gender, age, demand) that precedes the responsiveness of the larger and more fulsomely funded universities of other states. Tasmania was the first to encode the recognition of an Australian system of higher education within its legislation; less responsiveness to global developments, more responsiveness to developments across the Bass Strait. This tinkering with criteria for the distribution of scholarships is not dissimilar to the level of legislative change evident today.

When establishing a university, Tasmania provides evidence of replication of “genetic” material from other jurisdictions through sourcing its purposes from the University of Sydney. The University of Tasmania, like Sydney and Melbourne before, embedded a fixed recurrent endowment of £3,000, augmented with student fees. This design of the core financing mechanism at this point was shared by three universities, although the quantum of resourcing varied by state. In emulating aspects of the Universities of Sydney and Melbourne, Tasmania did so with a significant level of customisation, spanning key themes of activity (such as technical education) and micro detail (specific phrasing of the legislation).

Sir Walter Watson Hughes and The University of Adelaide, 1874

South Australia took a different route from New South Wales, Victoria and Tasmania in the establishment of a legislative mechanism for the financing of higher education. The University of Adelaide utilised a distinct financing mechanism from the point of origin. The university was forged through philanthropy, and the relationship between philanthropic donation and state funding was uniquely embedded in founding legislation. Sir Walter Watson Hughes donated £20,000 to support the establishment of the University of Adelaide in 1872, and subsequently the University of Adelaide Act was passed in 1874.56 The Act gave state backing and guaranteed that interest be paid on this endowment to fund the cost of professorships. The Act also allowed for additional grants to be made available, capped at £10,000 in any one year. The notion of a maximum grant pegged to interest on an endowment rather than fixed endowment ripples across time. The “maximum grant” for the university increased by £4,000 in 1911,57 to £20,000 in 1923,58 £30,000 in 193659 and £40,000 in 1943.60 More recently, Australian universities confronted the activation of maximum basic grant amount provisions in the Higher Education Support Act 2003. Policy actors surprised by this option were perhaps oblivious to the fact that the logic of a maximum rather than guaranteed or conditional grant has featured in Australia since 1874.

At the time of establishment, in 1874, there were two Australian universities on which the University of Adelaide could emulate. The university chose between Melbourne purposes to promote “sound learning” rather than “useful knowledge”. Like both Sydney and Melbourne,

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Adelaide was open to “all classes and denominations”. There is no reference within the Act to global references, but the language of “hereditaments” and surrounding text highlights the extent to which the genetic code of Adelaide was borrowed from Sydney and Melbourne. The pattern of University of Adelaide legislation following establishment paralleled that of the University of Sydney in that the university Act61 was the focal point for governance refinements in 187962 and land purchases in 1876.63

The University of Adelaide embedded references to disciplines through the degrees that it was able to offer but was distinctive for subsequent amendments that contracted rather than expanded the scope of operations. In 1879, the right to confer the Bachelor of Science and Doctor of Science was revoked.64 It was not until 1924 that the university’s powers to confer other degrees in addition to those previously specified (or repealed) was formally hardwired into legislation.65 Adelaide serves as a reminder that a trend towards growth and increasing complexity has not always been linear.

Consideration of who could be offered a degree, in the case of gender-based amendments to the University of Adelaide Act in 1880,66 highlights responsiveness to social and economic drivers. Overall, however, there was limited legislative activity in the early years of South Australia. At no point in the foundational era did South Australia make specific reference to universities within Appropriation Acts. By contrast, between 1850 and 1900 there were 24 years in which New South Wales Appropriation Acts made reference to the university.67 In Victoria, there were 19 years where additional appropriations were made. In Tasmania, this number was 12. It is feasible that additional support for higher education occurred within general departmental budgets referenced within Appropriation Acts (that do not specify higher education appropriations). Department funding for the University of Adelaide was not discoverable through the research design and is out of the scope for analysis.

Of the four institutions established before the turn of the century – Sydney, Melbourne, Adelaide and Tasmania – the meta, meso and micro detail points to a broad convergence on a university established via legislation, with some public funding, either fixed or relative to a philanthropic endowment, and with perpetual succession. The purposes of these institutions was split between public-oriented descriptions of “sound learning” and “useful knowledge”. All embedded references to disciplines, with subtle jurisdiction-specific differences to the courses that could be offered. All demonstrated responsiveness to the broader social context. Only one made any explicit reference to a global system of higher education. There was some shared specific wording. Together, this suggests that each jurisdiction exerted an influence on the legislation that its parliaments developed and passed, although they did not reinvent the wheel; borrowing ideas and phrasing and amending where appropriate. Even when taking a markedly different legislative approach, such as financing the building of the university, they converged on an identical outcome. One can question whether progress toward modernity and the establishment of universities in the 20th century maintained a path dependency based on a 19th century inheritance or adopted an entirely new approach.

University Endowment and the University of Western Australia, 1904 to 1911

Higher education in New South Wales and Victoria began with a university Act that embedded a fixed annual endowment within the establishment of a perpetual administrative structure. Tasmania also adopted this approach, after 30 years of outsourcing higher education to other jurisdictions via scholarships. Western Australia, by comparison, began with an endowment

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mechanism without a university, through the University Endowment Act 190468. The endowment was established with oversight by trustees and with perpetual succession. The Endowment Act was only repealed in the year 2000, with powers for asset management integrated into the University of Western Australia Act.69 Perpetual succession in this case lasted just shy of a century.

The 1909 Appropriation Act70 made provision for university extension lectures at Kalgoorlie; this again pre-dating the actual establishment of a university. It was not until 1911 that the University of Western Australia was brought into being.71 The Act noted that Western Australia was the last state in the Commonwealth to establish a university. At this stage, the university now had five universities to choose from in terms of drafting its university Act and establishing its financing mechanism. There is again evidence of text reuse and local customisation.

Sydney and Tasmania’s “useful knowledge”, and Melbourne and Adelaide’s “sound learning” were recombined in Western Australia to serve purposes of “sound knowledge and useful learning by lack of opportunity or means”. This was contextualised with content about the social and economic purposes of the university to “advance prosperity” and ensure “assistance … be afforded those … hindered … by lack of opportunity or means”.

The Act sees the university endowment vested and transferred to the control of the university’s Senate. An annual endowment of £13,500 was established in addition to any funds and property in the endowment fund. In precise and not insignificant wording, the Act allowed the Senate of the university to establish “The fees, if any” for students.72 The inaugural Chancellor of the University, Sir John Winthrop Hackett, died in 1916, donating an estate worth over £400,000;73 over $32 million74 in today’s terms. The Hackett donation was large enough to make tuition effectively free at the University of Western Australia for decades to come.

Like those before, the University of Western Australia was also set up as a body corporate for perpetual succession. It was unique at this point for making no reference within its Act in relation to disciplines. It was also unique in founding legislation in linking the degrees, diplomas and certificates it could offer to those available in the United Kingdom.75 This demonstrated a growing maturity of legislation drafting, and refinement of the university Act as a government mechanism that set out, in administrative detail, the purposes and powers of the governing body to manage the affairs of the university. This was a marked evolution away from the founding Acts of earlier universities, which were more prescriptive in their activities.

The University of Queensland, 1906

In a further sign that each jurisdiction operated in a manner that represented a response to its specific and immediate context, the establishment of the University of Queensland represented an alternative sequence of legislative activity. The establishment of the university was first made possible by 1906 legislation that reserved land for university establishment (amongst other public uses).76 The University of Queensland Act was passed in 1909,77 with its purposes adopting the Melbourne language of “sound learning” but augmented with language consistent with broader changes to the idea of the university:

WHEREAS it is desirable to promote sound learning, to encourage original research and invention, and to provide the means of obtaining a liberal and practical education

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in the several pursuits and professions of life in Queensland, and for such purposes to incorporate and endow a University open to all classes and denominations of His Majesty’s subjects.

Not only has Her Majesty been succeeded by His Majesty, but the university’s purpose includes reference to original research and invention, a liberal and practical education, and distinct reference to professional life. The University of Queensland Act served as a more mature statement of legal drafting than the founding documents of preceding universities. It was more stable as a result, and between 1909 to 1950 was amended only three times. There remained mechanisms open to the Queensland Parliament to support the development of the university and respond to various social and economic priorities. The University of Queensland Act included a fixed annual endowment of £10,000, but Appropriation Acts made provision for additional funds to the university in almost every year spanning 1910 to 1950.78

The University of Queensland, like other universities already established, had perpetual succession. Whilst more generic about the awards it could confer in any branch of knowledge, it was more specific about the internal structures of the university, and required, as a minimum, that it maintain Faculties of Arts, Science, and Engineering. The Act also embedded a responsiveness to social and economic expectations. There were requirements to provide scholarships and make provision for entry of students who may not have matriculated. There was, however, little reference embedded within the legislation of relevance to a global system of higher education.

The University of New South Wales, 1949

In exploring jurisdictional similarities and differences between states in their support for higher education and the establishment of universities, it is acknowledged that legislation evolves. Comparing the University of Queensland or Western Australia with the University of Sydney Act of 1850 fails to take into account progress and changes to the University of Sydney’s legislation in the intervening period. Examining legislation at the point of origin for universities across each state does, however, highlight both distinct jurisdictional differences in approach, and evidence of an evolving social and higher education context.

The representation of gender in university Acts highlights an interplay between jurisdiction, evolving social norms and convergence on specific text and ideas. References to gender within university Acts highlight legislative alignment with changing expectations. States embraced a more inclusive approach at different points in time, borrowing the specific legal phrasing from jurisdictions who confronted these issues at an earlier point in time. The University of Sydney founding Act, for example, was gender-neutral in its language of being open “to all classes and denominations”, even if in practice this meant open to all classes of white men. A legislative distinction was made by 1884 that “benefits and advantages” of the University of Sydney were “deemed to extend in all respects to women equally with men”.79 Reference to gender was embedded in the University of Tasmania Act in its 1889 establishment, adopting the language of conferral of degrees to “persons of either sex”;80 this building on gender-inclusive scholarships legislation in 1871. Queensland81 and Western Australia82 adopted, with minor changes, the wording utilised within the 1884 University of Sydney amendment – rights, advantages and privileges – extended to women. Over a 30-year period, spanning 1884 to 1911, gender was normalised as an equal right within university legislation across multiple states using near-identical phrasing. Each jurisdiction simultaneously mediating social

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expectations and context independently but borrowing, where appropriate, the legislative text generated across state borders.

The establishment of the University of New South Wales provides a yardstick to observe how things may have evolved within a jurisdiction, rather than between jurisdictions. As foreshadowed in earlier chapters, the establishment of the New South Wales University of Technology in 1949 marks a conceptual transition point in the history of the Australian higher education system and research design. No longer were states served by single universities being all things to all people. Instead, we have the makings of a more graduated and differentiated model; a higher education system within a state, not just a barely coordinated national system comprised of states, each with a single institution.

By the time the New South Wales University of Technology was being established through legislation, there was already a process of differentiation underway. Provision to establish university colleges outside of the Sydney metropolitan area was legislated in 1937,83 with funding for these purposes included in a 1938 Appropriations Act.84 This laid the foundation for the subsequent establishment of the University of New England and University of Newcastle. The university and policy context was evidently becoming more complicated.

The complexity of the system is illustrated by the enabling Act for the University of Technology being the first to be entwined with broader legislation, and regulation of technical education rather than stand-alone legislation.85 The framing of heredity claims made in Table 3 on page 77 can be used to compare and contrast the legislation, enabling the University of Sydney (as it evolved from 1850 to its form in 1949), and establishment of the University of New South Wales Institute of Technology (Table 5). This highlights that jurisdictions are not static policymaking systems across time. The social, economic and policymaking context shifts. Jurisdictional differences are evident across state lines, and points in time. Notwithstanding these differences, there remains evidence of ideas and text being shared across jurisdictions and across time, with varying degrees of customisation.

Table 5. Comparison of Heredity Claims Between the University and University Colleges Act 1900–1948 and New South Wales University of Technology Act 1949

Heredity Claims: University and University Colleges Act, 1900–194886

New South Wales University of Technology Act 194987

University legislation is financing legislation.

paid out of the Consolidated Revenue Fund the sum of one hundred and twenty-five thousand pounds

pay to the University the amount by which the approved expenditure exceeds the income from all sources of the University (s.39.(2))

Financing legislation has perpetual characteristics.

The University of Sydney is the body politic and corporate incorporated by that name under the Act fourteenth Victoria number thirty-one, and shall, by that name, have a perpetual succession

The University shall be a body corporate under the name of “The New South Wales University of Technology” with perpetual succession (s.16.(2))

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Heredity Claims: University and University Colleges Act, 1900–194886

New South Wales University of Technology Act 194987

Disciplines and forms of academic work are embedded in financing legislation.

confer the several degrees of Bachelor, Master, and Doctor, and such other degrees and such certificates in the nature of degrees as it thinks fit in all branches of knowledge, except theology and divinity

may provide courses in applied science, engineering, technology, commerce, industrial organisation and such other related courses as it deems fit (s.25.(a))

Financing legislation serves broader social purposes.

WHEREAS it is expedient for the better advancement of religion and morality and the promotion of useful knowledge

… an encouragement for pursuing a regular and liberal course of education.

The objects of the University shall include…

(a) to provide facilities for higher specialised instruction and advanced training in the various branches of technology and science in their application to industry and commerce; and

(b) to aid by research and other suitable means the advancement, development, and practical application of science to industry and commerce. (s.18)

Linkages to global developments are embedded in financing legislation.

Senate may report to the Governor the medical institutions and schools, whether incorporated or not, in the city of Sydney, from which, either singly or jointly with other medical institutions and schools in New South Wales or in foreign parts

No references to global developments identified

The first point of difference evident from these heredity claims relates to university endowment. In 1949, the University of Sydney continued to benefit from a legislated endowment of £125,000 per annum, whereas the New South Wales University of Technology was guaranteed an income based on the difference between approved expenditure and other income. The financing model for the University of Sydney did not serve as a path dependency for the New South Wales University of Technology. This difference moved the focal point of influence in university finances from fixed and continuing public financial commitment combined with student fees and other revenue sources to one that was contingent on other public policy and budgeting processes. This commitment was relative to expenditure budgets approved by the State Governor rather than parliamentary process.

The change in financing mechanism was not a spontaneous feature unique to the New South Wales University of Technology. The text used to shape the financing of the New South Wales Institute of Technology can be found over a decade earlier in the legislation, which enabled the establishment of university colleges within the University of Sydney beyond the Sydney metropolitan area.88 Those involved in drafting the legislation for parliamentary approval

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reached back in time within the New South Wales legislature, although not so far back as to base their legislation on the University of Sydney.

Both universities adopted the model of perpetual succession, but whereas Sydney had an espoused purpose centred on “advancement of religion and morality and the promotion of useful knowledge”, New South Wales was concerned with science, industry and commerce. The specialist focus put a spotlight on specific disciplines upon which the University of New South Wales would focus. This was in contrast to the drift in disciplinary specificity that Sydney had lost across time and ability to award degrees in anything beyond theology. Sydney retained a foreign connection that was absent from the New South Wales University of Technology.

The legislation that shaped the universities of Sydney and New South Wales stands to highlight significant differences that arose in “financing legislation” across the century under examination. It also serves to highlight that at the cusp of the onset of Commonwealth higher education financing legislation, the nature of the university and higher education systems evolved considerably from colonial origins. Morality and useful knowledge were retained by Sydney a century after first being encoded in legislation, ossified into quasi-permanence. New institutional forms and functions build on this history, and, in doing so, reveal the transition to the modern research university, serving industry and commerce rather than God and His or Her Majesty. At this point, it is worth taking stock of the jurisdictional similarities and differences in state establishment of higher education from 1850 to 1950. This being a pre-cursor to analysis of the origins of the Commonwealth’s approach to financing legislation.

Heredity and State Jurisdictions, 1850 to 1950

The model of heredity adopted by this dissertation is an elaboration of the policy cycle depicted in Figure 3 (Page 51). Through examining the onset of higher education across each of the states, the significance of jurisdictions to the public policy process component of the cycle is clearer. Given each state operates under a Westminster model of government, within reasonable geographic proximity and a level of interconnectedness, one might expect to see significant similarities between each state’s university, or higher education financing legislation. Preceding sections suggest that whilst there is evidence of convergence on a similar path,89 each legislature has adopted a distinct approach to the creation of higher education and universities within its jurisdiction.

The macro outcome is broadly the same: the production of a university serving state interests. The meso picture is more nuanced, with variations in the sequence of activities that leads to the establishment of a university, including the use of scholarships, bequests and land purchases. The micro detail highlights a degree of text specificity, and text reuse and borrowing that reaches across state boundaries and time. This suggests strong interconnections between states in the development of their higher education systems, even when responding to the unique social, economic and political needs of their constituents. This detail can be understood through the heredity metaphor as the genetic material that is replicated, duplicated, amended or deleted at various points in time. The jurisdictional features of the heredity model are depicted in Figure 6, emphasising the wording used to describe the social purposes of higher education, and the basis of financing.

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Figure 6. Heredity and the Onset of Higher Education by States, 1850 to 1911

Interpreting the degree of similarity or difference across higher education financing origin stories requires a level of judgement within clearly defined values and assumptions. One can ask whether “sound learning” is demonstrably different to “useful knowledge” as a means of signalling the purposes of the university. It is a potential distraction to get too caught up in these semantic differences. Discovering the intent and rationale of Western Australia in adopting the recombined test of “sound knowledge and useful learning” would require a different research design best left to historians. One cannot exclude the possibility that this phrasing is borrowed from an entirely different source than preceding university legislation.90 Knowledge and learning terminology is, however, demonstrably different from “advanced training”.

Through putting a spotlight on these highly specific phrases and wording, attention is drawn to the role of legislation drafters, proponents and approvers. Each jurisdiction operates within its own social context and can make a choice to go it alone with bespoke wording, or, as is evident in university origin legislation, to borrow and paraphrase from each other. This is evident not just in the precise wording used in legislation, but also in the model of financing adopted by each state. Path dependencies and differences are evident at a macro, meso and micro level, and contribute to the heredity of higher education and inheritance of characteristics across time. This is not insignificant at the midpoint of the century as the Commonwealth began to play a stronger role.

THE HIGHER EDUCATION PUBLIC POLICY CYCLE: A COMMONWEALTH PERSPECTIVE The Onset of Commonwealth Financing Legislation, 1900 to 1950

The Commonwealth did not exist at the point at which universities were established in Sydney, Melbourne, Adelaide and Hobart. The Australian Constitution was passed by an Act of the British Parliament on 9 July 1900,91 and set out how powers, collection of revenue and resources were to be shared amongst the state and Commonwealth from 1901 onwards.92

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Education was not one of the Commonwealth’s powers specified in the Constitution, and the orthodox narrative is that the Commonwealth remained disconnected from university affairs until World War II. The National report on Australia’s higher education sector93 summarised university financing from 1939 in roughly decade-long intervals to 1980.94 The report acknowledged some Commonwealth support prior to 1939 through a “minor contribution to research”,95 rounding this to zero for 1939. By 1950, the Commonwealth’s contribution had grown to 20.5%, reaching a peak of 89.3% in 1981.

The report’s financial analysis has been cited in many reports,96 cementing its status as orthodoxy. In the 2010 Boyer Lectures97 and Republic of Learning, Glyn Davis describes aspects of the Commonwealth’s role in research funding with more nuance. There remains, however, little by way of literature identified that might describe the specific approaches undertaken by the Commonwealth, as a distinct jurisdiction, to make legislation relating to higher education and universities.

The first legislation this research has identified is the establishment of the Institute of Science and Industry in 1920.98 This institute was the precursor to the CSIRO, and was empowered to undertake research, award research scholarships, and award research grants. The institute also empowered the Governor General to arrange with state governors for the cooperation of universities, the advancement of teaching of science in universities, and research training. This provided a platform for the Commonwealth to engage with universities, whilst operating within constitutional limits. By 1926, the Commonwealth passed additional legislation to create a “Commonwealth Council for Scientific and Industrial Research” (CSIR); a little more salubrious than a mere institute.99 The Council was backed by a separately legislated endowment of £100,000, for which interest on principle and other funding that may be added to the pool, and capital, could be payable for CSIR purposes.100 Together, there was a mission to fund research, award grants, support research training and (amongst other things) coordinate universities. A further £250,000 was added to this endowment in 1928.101 The Commonwealth’s initial forays into financing of higher education adopted a different mechanism from the states, although there are parallels with the University of Adelaide’s funding being conditional on a hypothecated rate of interest on a large (although philanthropically established) endowment.

The next point at which the Commonwealth passed financing legislation was 1937. Minor governance changes to the CSIR102 were passed, and an endowment for medical research was established through the creation of the National Health and Medical Research Council103 (NHMRC). Like the CSIR before, the endowment could be supplemented with additional appropriations, and payments could be drawn from capital or interest. Universities were one of multiple potential beneficiaries. Much of the text was a “cut and paste” from the CSIR Endowment Act; an additional example of legislative text being borrowed from that drafted for other purposes, creating a micro-level path dependency.

Over the following decade, further amendments were made to the CSIR. A further increase in endowment was passed in 1938,104 and minor changes to Council membership in 1945.105 The next amendment in 1949 was significant in that it wrote universities out of the Act. The Council could still support research training and grants, but universities were no longer specified as a destination of funds. Thereafter, CSIR and related Acts are no longer considered within the scope for analysis.

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An additional item of Commonwealth legislation worth noting is legislation establishing and amending the Australian National University (ANU).106 Like those before, ANU was set up with perpetual succession as a body corporate. There was no “sound learning”, or “useful knowledge”, nor reference to gender or social needs of this character. Instead, there was a focus on postgraduate research, research schools and specialist training appropriate for the public service107. This was supported by a fixed annual endowment of £325,000, supplemented by student fees. The university was concerned with the national interest but had no overt references to global developments in higher education. The governance provisions of the Act were similar to that which had evolved in other universities, but the ANU was very much a new and distinct form of institution aligned with the specific jurisdictional interests of the Commonwealth.

The Commonwealth emulated the South Australian practice of drafting Appropriation Acts without line-by-line details evident at various points in other jurisdictions. There is evidence that the Commonwealth was making payments to universities through departmental appropriations across the post-war period. Commonwealth reports on expenditure in 1927, for example, highlight payments made for salaries for Japanese teaching, university fees and a chair in anthropology.108 None of which had an explicit home in Commonwealth legislation. None of which fitted well with orthodox explanations of the role that the sciences played in enabling the Commonwealth’s encroachment into funding of higher education.

This grey zone of Commonwealth funding, perhaps funnelled through departmental budgets, or the CSIR or NHMRC, exposes limits to the heredity model. The research methodology privileges the status of legislation in the transmission of inherited characteristics. Significant funds could be directed to universities without legislation that explicitly referenced the university or higher education. Notable examples in the lead up to the Commonwealth’s overt and explicit entry into higher education were the provision of scholarships through the war period, and provision of scholarships through the Commonwealth Reconstruction Scheme. Annual reports of the period highlight that some 10% of students at the University of Melbourne were in receipt of Commonwealth financial support in 1943 and 1944.109 This was achieved without any legislation consistent with the definition of “financing legislation” used within this research.

In 1945, legislation enabling the Commonwealth Reconstruction Training Scheme was passed, making no reference to universities or higher education or related terminology.110 Emphasis was on “vocational education (including training for a professional occupation)”.111 This legislation did not make the cut on the first pass of isolating relevant Commonwealth legislation, but this omission was rectified through the iterative inductive research process adopted. This Re-establishment and Employment Act 1945 enabled a major influx of returned service personnel to participate in higher education, without specifying universities or higher education within its text. In 1948, 38% of all enrolments in universities were funded by the Training Scheme.112 The policy and financing ecosystem is complex, and too strict an inclusion criterion could easily exclude important legislative detail.

The mix of Commonwealth (and state) funding for universities – spanning legislated endowments, conditional grants, the grey zone of non-specific grants and appropriations, philanthropic bequests and student fees that combine in the aftermath of global conflict – is the backdrop for the onset of Commonwealth funding. The Australian Bureau of Statistics

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(ABS) Year Book describes the state of university finances and student enrolments for the year 1950.113 Less than a quarter of the 30,000 students enrolled across the sector were now funded by the Commonwealth Reconstruction Scheme, down from 38% just two years earlier.114 Total sector resourcing was now £4.1 million;115 the system having grown enormously from a £5,000 endowment first codified a century before. The National report on Australia’s higher education sector aggregated and segmented ABS data to describe the role of the Commonwealth, states and students in system financing pre- and post-World War II. This aggregate approach masked variation between states in their scale, funding mechanisms and level of resourcing per student. This variability is described in Table 6.

Table 6. Higher Education Statistics, Select Universities, 1950116

University Revenue £ '000

Students Revenue per Student

£

% Revenue Government

University of Melbourne 1,069 9,003 118 48

University of Sydney 992 9,383 106 40

University of Queensland 536 4,245 126 66

University of Western Australia 460 1,840 250 54

University of Adelaide 431 4,664 92 65

University of Tasmania 167 670 249 85

States Grants (Universities) Act 1951

Given the Commonwealth is a federation of the states, without constitutional powers relating to education, the variation described in Table 6 represented a distinct jurisdictional challenge for the Commonwealth’s engagement with higher education. Rather than responding to distinct, localised social objectives, such as the “advancement of religion and morality” or embracing higher education specific ideals of “useful knowledge”, the Commonwealth engaged with an idea of the university and higher education that already existed. This idea adopted various guises as a result of the specific legislative context of constituent parts. This idea was one that the Commonwealth already funded through scholarships and research grants. There were various options at the Commonwealth’s disposal to formalise its engagement, which plausibly span: the endowment approach of the CSIR and NHMRC; the scholarship approach of the Re-establishment and Employment Act; and the allocation of funds through departmental budgeted appropriations. The distinct financing approach of each state, including fixed endowment, other university-specific legislation and Appropriation Acts provided an additional suite of options for the Commonwealth to draw upon.

The Commonwealth navigated these options by settling on what at the time was seen as a complex Bill of five pages, which ultimately evolved into the current behemoth. The Bill, much

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like this dissertation, stands at a point in time reflecting on the past, and looking forward to the future. The Prime Minister’s second reading speech making the point:

The bill may appear to be rather complex in its drafting, but I have been assured by the draftsman that the complexity was inevitable because of the fact that the bill deals partly with a period that has gone by, partly with a period that is current, and partly with a period that is still two years ahead. Consequently, having regard to our negotiations with the States, it was essential that a distinction should be made between the basic grant and the conditions that will attach to it, and the second level grant and the conditions that will attach to it in future.117

Given the importance of the Act to future developments, it is worth delving into the process that gave rise to the Act, to consider the structure and format of the legislation, and to assess similarities and differences with the heredity claims made about universities based on their enabling legislation.

As noted earlier, by 1950, Commonwealth funds through the Reconstruction Training Scheme were beginning to fade. The spike in enrolments of returned services personnel contributed a remarkable responsiveness of the sector. University of Melbourne enrolments tripled from a mid-war low of 3,228 in 1942 to 9,506 in 1948.118 Much of the increase at the University of Melbourne was accommodated in a temporary campus in Mildura, with Victoria allocating initially £112,000, and which increased to £212,000 to support its operations.119 Funding for this first-year temporary campus was more than the total revenue to the University of Tasmania. The experiment was short-lived, however, leaving footprints in the red dust, and a campus periodical that provided an enjoyable insight into post-war life and optimism.120

The rapid growth and contraction in funding was particularly severe given the Reconstruction Training Scheme covered the full cost of education, not just the student fees.121 All state universities were affected and lobbied the Commonwealth for additional funds. A Select Committee of Enquiry was established, whose recommendations were accepted by the Commonwealth. The intent of the Commonwealth’s response was to provide grants to universities on a population basis, funnel grants through the states’ treasuries, with grants calculated relative to states’ grants and other revenue, incorporate all existing Commonwealth grants, and provide other grants where necessary.122

The States Grants (Universities) Act 1951123 is like the University of Sydney Act (1850); the product of a policy cycle, informed by an enquiry, and in response to social needs. The structure of the Act was such that it exerted considerable influence over the years ahead, up to and potentially beyond 2020. The definitions adopted by the Act included a distinction in student fees to exclude student organisation fees.124 This distinction has played out as a fault-line in higher education policy for decades. The precise definition of “fee” also proved to be highly conserved and resilient in future Commonwealth legislation. The Act made a distinction between operating grants and capital works grants,125 and required that money not be expended on capital works. Capital funding has also been a sticking point for policy debates over subsequent decades and remains a point of exclusion in many grants operating today.126 The Act defined university purposes through broad categories of teaching and research purposes,127 leaving moral sentiment and social good to the states and institutions, for the time being.

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The past, present and future dimensions of the Act make for reading that is every bit as impenetrable as the legislation of today. Grants were made relative to that paid out in 1950 through the Training Scheme and for various research programs.128. Grants were paid at a third of the anticipated state grants and other revenue received by universities, establishing a Commonwealth/state funding mix of 25%/75%. This funding mix did not include other Commonwealth payments listed, which increased the Commonwealth’s proportion of funding above 25%. The funding formula was also expressed with subtle differences to cover current and subsequent years.129 Additional grants were also made to support residential colleges and their fees.130

Within a single, succinct item of legislation, a number of important developments are evident, relevant to the heredity claims made already within this chapter, which were found to be broadly applicable to financing legislation described for university establishment over the preceding century.

1. University legislation is financing legislation: The States Grants Act turned this proposition inside out. The legislation was, by definition, wholly concerned with distributing funds to universities, consistent with their existing purposes.

2. Financing legislation has perpetual characteristics: The States Grants Act was also at odds with this proposition. The Act provided funding for a fixed period and for specific purposes, echoing the three years of funding to support the building of the universities of Sydney and Melbourne in the mid-1850s, rather than establishing a clear, sustainable financing model, such as fixed endowment or endowment fund.

3. Disciplines and forms of academic work are embedded in financing legislation: Disciplines were embedded in the State Grants Act with references to the Engineering Board affiliated with the University of Tasmania, and Commonwealth research funding for physical, social and biological sciences.

4. Financing legislation serves broader social purposes: There was no explicit content within the legislation that connected higher education to broader social purposes. There was a clearer statement of purpose embedded within the manner of introduction of this legislation,131 but this purpose was clearly absent from the legislation itself.

5. Linkages to global developments are embedded in financing legislation: The arcane reference to foreign considerations in the University of Sydney Act was not one that was adopted en masse or with any degree of maturity by other states. The States Grants Act similarly did not include reference to global developments, beyond national interest statements made during the second reading speech for the Bill.

HEREDITY AND JURISDICTIONS SUMMARY OF FINDINGS

Four out of five claims about heredity broadly supported by analysis of university enabling legislation across the states are not replicated with the onset of Commonwealth financing legislation. One might question the point of making these claims when they have proven so brittle in relation to the important onset of Commonwealth higher education financing legislation. However, when viewed through the prism of heredity and an integrated higher

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education public policy cycle, the outcome is predictable. Different jurisdictions and legislatures will respond to the social, economic and political forces in different ways, all within the parameters of their unique policy context. The differences in approach were more subtly evident as universities were established at comparable times (Sydney and Melbourne), and with more substantive differences at various points thereafter (Adelaide and Tasmania in the later 1800s, Queensland and Western Australia in the early 20th century, and the Australian National University and New South Wales University of Technology at the midpoint of the 20th century).

For the most part of a century, however, there remained a broadly consistent macro theme of states establishing universities in perpetuity. There were differences in the sequencing through which universities were established at a meso level. The micro detail was more complicated in terms of the specific phrases used in legislative drafting. The common features of state-based legislation can be understood as a legislation sub-system, with each jurisdiction broadly following the same path. The Commonwealth adopted a substantively different approach, and an entirely different form of legislation. This was a new era for higher education;132 a new means and approach to financing legislation. This had the potential to establish a new path dependency and legislation sub-system influencing the heredity of Australian higher education. Legislative patterns evident within the states and at the onset of Commonwealth financing legislation are depicted in Figure 7.

Any generalisable insights emerging from the heredity model must be contextualised to the specific features of the relevant legislature under consideration, be it state or Commonwealth. Whilst this chapter has considered higher education mainly from the point of origin and early foundational era of universities across jurisdictions, the following chapter considers the evolution of higher education financing legislation across time. Closer attention is paid to the dynamics and interactions between public policy and higher education.

Figure 7. Heredity and the Onset of Commonwealth Financing Legislation, 1850 to 1950

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1 Martin Trow, “Defining the issues in university-government relations: An international perspective,” Studies in Higher Education, 8, no. 2 (1983); 115–128, 117.

2 Eric Ashby, “The case for ivory towers,” Higher education in tomorrow’s world: A symposium of the International Conference of Higher Education Commemorating the Sesquicentennial of the University of Michigan, April 26–29, 1967, ed, Algo. D. Henderson, (University of Michigan, 1968).

3 Eric Ashby, “Ivory Towers in Tomorrow’s World.” Journal of Higher Education, 38, no. 8 (1967): 417-427.

4 Martin Trow, “American higher education: Past, present, and future,” Educational Researcher, 17, no. 3 (1998): 13 -23.

5 University of Sydney Act 1850 (NSW).

6 New South Wales, Proceedings of the Legislative Council, 4 December 1844. M. Bland, 12.

7 Medical Witnesses at Inquests Act 1844 (NSW); Medical Witnesses at Inquests Act 1845 (NSW).

8 Geoffrey Sherington and Julia Horne, “Empire, state and public purpose in the founding of universities and colleges in the Antipodes,” History of Education Review, 39, no. 2 (2010): 35-51.

9 New South Wales, Votes and Proceedings of the Legislative Council, 4 September 1849, 12.

10 New South Wales, Votes and Proceedings of the Legislative Council, 6 September 1849, 6.

11 New South Wales, Votes and Proceedings of the Legislative Council, 21 September 1849, 2.

12 New South Wales, Votes and Proceedings of the Legislative Council, 28 September 1849, 6.

13 New South Wales, Votes and Proceedings of the Legislative Council, 2 October 1849, 1.

14 New South Wales, Votes and Proceedings of the Legislative Council, 5 October 1849, 6.

15 Report from Select Committee on Sydney University (1849); and, Russell Fletcher Doust, New South Wales Legislative Council 1824–1856: The Select Committees (New South Wales Parliamentary Library, 2011).

16 Doust, New South Wales Legislative Council 1824–1856: The Select Committees, 212.

17 New South Wales, Votes and Proceedings of the Legislative Council, 16 August 1850, 1.

18 Department of Employment Education and Training, National report on Australia’s higher education sector (Australian Government Publishing Service, Canberra, 1993)

19 Paul Cairney, “The role of evidence in theories of the policy process,” The politics of evidence-based policy making, ed, Paul Cairney (Palgrave Pivot, London, 2016), 13–50, 18.

20 Julia Horne and Geoffrey Sherington, “Extending the educational franchise: The social contract of Australia’s public universities, 1850–1890,” Paedagogica Historica, 46, no. 1–2 (2010): 207–227.

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21 Geoffrey Sherington and Julia Horne, “Empire, state and public purpose in the founding of universities and colleges in the Antipodes,”

22 Hugh Philp, R. L. Debus, Vija Veidemanis, and W. F. Connell, The University and its community (Ian Novak Publishing, 1964).

23 Sydney University Act 1852 (NSW).

24 New South Wales, Votes and Proceedings of the Legislative Council, 23 November 1852, 2.

25 Sydney University Act 1853 No 18a (NSW).

26 Sydney University Act 1853 No 28a (NSW).

27 Richard Joseph Wheeler Selleck, The Shop: The University of Melbourne, 1850-1939 (Melbourne Univ. Publishing, 2003).

28 An Act to incorporate and endow the University of Melbourne 1853 (Vic).

29 Sherington and Horne, “Empire, state and public purpose in the founding of universities and colleges in the Antipodes”.

30 John L. Orr, “Australian corporate universities and the Corporations Act,” International Journal of Law and Education, 17, no. 2 (2012): 123–148.

31 Ibid, 125.

32 Bruce Lindsay “Student subjectivity and the law,” Deakin Law Review, 10, no. 2 (2005): 628–638), 638.

33 Australian Institute of Company Directors, “The Role of the Board and Practice of Directorship,” Company Directors Course 1 (Australian Institute of Company Directors, 2019), 35.

34 Ian Marshman and Frank Larkins, Modelling individual Australian universities resilience in managing overseas student revenue losses from the COVID-19 pandemic (Melbourne Centre for the Study of Higher Education, University of Melbourne, 2020), retrieved 17 June 2020 https://melbourne-cshe.unimelb.edu.au/lh-martin-institute/insights/modelling-individual-australian-universities-resilience-in-managing-overseas-student-revenue-losses-from-the-covid-19-pandemic.

35 University of Sydney Act 1850 (NSW), s. 1, s 2.; An Act to incorporate and endow the University of Melbourne 1853 (Vic), s. 1.

36 University and University Colleges (Amendment) Act 1902 (NSW).

37 Specific additional funding allocations for the University of Sydney were evident in Appropriation Acts in years spanning 1874 to 1902, with the exception of 1875, 1876 and 1888.

38 Sydney University Act 1853 No 28a (NSW), s.1.

39 An Act for applying certain Sums arising from the Revenue receivable in the Colony of Victoria to the Service thereof, for the year One thousand eight hundred and fifty-four, and for further appropriating the said Revenue 1854 (Vic), 10.; An Act for applying certain Sums arising from the Revenue receivable in the Colony of Victoria to the Service thereof, for the year One thousand eight hundred and fifty-five, and for further appropriating the said Revenue 1855 (Vic), 178.; An Act for applying certain sums arising from the Revenue receivable in Victoria to the Service thereof for the year One thousand eight hundred and fifty-six and for further appropriating the said revenue 1856 (Vic), 93.

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40 Sydney University Act 1853 No 28a (NSW), s.1.

41 Victoria, Proceedings of the First Legislative Council, 28 February 1856, 1.

42 Glyn Davis, “The Australian idea of a university” Meanjin, 72, no. 3 (2013): 32.

43 The Tasmanian Council of Education and Scholarship Act 1858 (Tas).

44 An Act to Appropriate a Sum Of 800 Pounds to Mr Charles Seymour Dowdell in Lieu of a Tasmanian Scholarship (46 Vic, No 49) 1882 (Tas).

45 University of Melbourne, University of Melbourne Calendar 1883-1884, Annual Report 1882-83 (University of Melbourne, 1883) 261.

46 The Tasmanian Council of Education and Scholarship Act, No 2 (35 Vic, No 16) 1871 (Tas).

47 The University Act 1881 (Vic), s. 15.

48 University Extension Act of 1884 (NSW), s. 3.

49 The Tasmanian Council of Education and Scholarship Act, No 3 (42 Vic, No 30) 1879 (Tas), s.1.

50 The Tasmanian Council of Education and Scholarship Act (51 Vic, No 22) 1887 (Tas), s.1.

51 The Appropriation Act 1925–26 (16 Geo V, No 26) 1925 (Tas), 447.

52 Hannah Forsyth, A history of the modern Australian university (NewSouth Publishing, 2014), 17.

53 Ibid, 22.

54 The Tasmanian Council of Education and Scholarship Act 1858 (Tas), preamble.

55 The Tasmanian University Act (53 Vic, No 41) 1889 (Tas), preamble.

56 The donation of Walter Watson Hughes is embedded in the Adelaide University Act (No 20 of 37 and 38 Vic, 1874) 1874 (SA), preamble.

57 The Adelaide University Act Amendment Act (No 1058 of 1911) 1911 (SA), s.10.

58 Adelaide University Act Amendment Act (No 1555 of 1923) 1923 (SA), s.3.

59 University of Adelaide Act Amendment Act (No 2327 of 1936) 1936 (SA), s.2.(1).

60 University of Adelaide Act Amendment Act (No 9 of 1943) 1943 (SA), s.3.

61 Adelaide University Act (No 20 of 37 and 38 Vic, 1874) 1874 (SA).

62 Adelaide University Act (No 143 of 42 and 43 Vic, 1879) 1879 (SA).

63 University Site Act (No 45 of 39 and 40 Vic, 1876) 1876 (SA).

64 Adelaide University Act (No 143 of 42 and 43 Vic, 1879) 1879 (SA), s.3.

65 Adelaide University Act Amendment Act (No 1614 of 1924) 1924 (SA), s.5.

66 Adelaide University Act (No 172 of 43 and 44 Vic, 1880) 1880 (SA), s.3.

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67 New South Wales Appropriation Acts made specific appropriations for the University of Sydney in every year from 1874 to 1900, with the exception of 1875, 1876 and 1888; Victoria Appropriations Acts made specific appropriations for the University of Melbourne in 1854 to 1856; 1859 to 1861; 1863 and 1864; 1872 and 1873; 1876 and 187; 1883 to 1891; 1893 to 1898; and 1900; Tasmanian Appropriation Acts make specific appropriations for the University of Tasmania and Scholarships from 1887 to 1900, with the exception of 1892 and 1899.

68 University Endowment Act 1904 (WA).

69 Universities Legislation Amendment Act 2000 (No 75 of 2000) (WA).

70 Appropriation No 2 (No 20 of 1909) 1909 (WA), Schedule B, IX.

71 The University of Western Australia Act, 1911 (WA).

72 Ibid, s. 31. (1). (p).

73 Australian Bureau of Statistics, Official Year Book of the Commonwealth of Australia No. 20. – 1927, (Australian Bureau of Statistics, 1927), 441.

74 University of Western Australia, “Winthrop Hackett: The first bequest,” retrieved 1 June 2020, https://www.uwa.edu.au/profile/john-winthrop-hackett

75 The University of Melbourne was able to make any award available at other universities in “the British Dominions” as a result of amendments made by: The University Act 1890 (Vic), s.25.

76 Public Works Land Resumption Act of 1906 (6 Edw VII, No 14) 1906 (Qld), s.4.i.

77 University of Queensland Act of 1909 (9 Edw VII, No 7) 1909 (Qld), preamble.

78 Queensland Appropriation Acts made specific appropriations for the University of Queensland every year from 1910 to 1950, with the exception of 1917, 1919, 1941 and 1948.

79 University Extension Act of 1884 No 15a 1884 (NSW), s. 3.

80 The Tasmanian University Act (53 Vic, No 41) 1889 (Tas), s. 9.

81 University of Queensland Act of 1909 (9 Edw VII, No 7) 1909 (Qld), s. 30.

82 The University of Western Australia Act, 1911 (WA) s. 40.

83 University and University Colleges (Amendment) Act 1937 No 30 1937 (NSW).

84 Appropriation Act, Act No 22, 1938 (NSW), 332.

85 Technical Education and New South Wales University of Technology Act 1949 No 11 1949 (NSW).

86 University and University Colleges (Amendment) Act 1948 (NSW).

87 Technical Education and New South Wales University of Technology Act 1949 No 11 (NSW).

88 University and University Colleges (Amendment) Act 1937 No 30 (NSW) s. 45 (1) and (2).

89 Glyn Davis makes the point that “when legislators sought to break the mould and create very different universities, they found the original model hard to resist”: Glyn Davis, The Australian idea of a university (Melbourne University Publishing 2017), 29.

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90 Various texts from the mid nineteenth century have been identified that use this phrasing, including: W. R. Robinson, Guide to Richmond: Comprising historical and descriptive notices of the castle, monastic remains, walks, views, &c. embracing Aske and Rokeby (W. R. Robinson, Richmond, 1833), 101.

91 Commonwealth of Australia Constitution Act 1900 (UK).

92 Paul Henderson, Parliament and politics in Australia: Political institutions and foreign relations (4th edition) (Heinemann Educational Australia, 1986), p1.

93 Department of Employment Education and Training, National report on Australia’s higher education sector.

94 Ibid, 75.

95 Ibid, 75.

96 Jane Lomax-Smith, Louise Watson, and Beth Webster, Higher education base funding review, final report (Department of Education, Employment and Workplace Relations, Canberra, 2011).; Geoff Sharrock, “Decoding Abbott’s plans for universities”, The Conversation. Retrieved 1 August 2017, http://theconversation.com/decoding-tony-abbotts-plans-for-universities-12540.; Andrew Norton, and Ittima Cherastidtham, Mapping Australian higher education, 2014–15, (Grattan Institute, 2014).

97 Glyn Davis, Boyer Lectures 2010: The republic of learning (Australian Broadcasting Corporation, 2010), published 14 November 2010, https://www.abc.net.au/radionational/programs/boyerlectures/series/boyer-lectures-2010-the-republic-of-learning/2981312

98 Institute of Science and Industry Act 1920 (No 22, 1920) (Cth).

99 Science and Industry Research Act 1926 (No 20, 1926) (Cth).

100 Science and Industry Endowment Act 1926 (No 21, 1926) (Cth), s.3.

101 Science and Industry Appropriation Act 1928 (No 27, 1928) (Cth), s.2.

102 Science and Industry Research Act 1937 (No 27, 1937) (Cth).

103 Medical Research Endowment Act 1937 (No 6, 1937) (Cth).

104 Science and Industry Research Appropriation Act 1938 (No 7, 1938) (Cth), s.4.

105 Science and Industry Research Act 1945 (No 25, 1945) (Cth), s.3, s.4.

106 Australian National University Act 1946 (Cth).

107 Ibid, s.6.

108 Government of The Commonwealth of Australia, Estimates of Receipts and Expenditure for The Year Ending 30th June, 1927 (Commonwealth of Australia, 1927), p163, 93 and 277.

109 University of Melbourne, University Calendar 1946, Statistics (University of Melbourne, 1946), 709, 711

110 Re-establishment and Employment Act 1945 (No 11, 1945) (Cth).

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111 Ibid, s. 50.(1).

112 Australian Bureau of Statistics, Official Year Book if the Commonwealth of Australian No.39. - 1953, (Australian Bureau of Statistics, 1953), 220.

113 Ibid.

114 Ibid, 221.

115 Ibid, 222, 224.

116 Ibid, 221, 222, 224.

117 Commonwealth of Australia, States Grants (Universities) Bill 1951 Second Reading Speech, House of Representatives Official Hansard, Tuesday, 27 November 1951, 2787 (Robert Menzies, Prime Minister).

118 University of Melbourne, University Calendar 1953, Statistics (University of Melbourne, 1953), 352.

119 University (Mildura Branch) Act 1946 (Vic).; University (Mildura Branch) Act 1947 (Vic).

120 University of Melbourne, “Dust: Magazine of the Mildura Branch University of Melbourne” (University of Melbourne. 1947, 1948, 1949) (1948), retrieved 1 July 2020, https://digitised-collections.unimelb.edu.au/handle/11343/32

121 University of Melbourne, University of Melbourne Calendar 1951, Annual Report 1950 (University of Melbourne, 1951), 480.

122 Ibid.

123 States Grants (Universities) Act 1951 (Cth).

124 Ibid, 3.

125 Ibid, s. 3. (1)(a).

126 Other Grants Guidelines (Education) 2012 (Cth) s. 1.110.10.10.

127 States Grants (Universities) Act 1951 (Cth), s. 3.

128 Ibid, s. 4.

129 Ibid, s. 5.

130 Ibid, s. 6. (2)(b)(i)

131 References to the purposes of higher education were described in the second reading speech:

“All honorable members will agree that the encouragement of higher education in Australia is a matter of first rate national importance…It has been an interesting feature of Australian life that since the war the number of young men and women anxious to avail themselves of university training has increased beyond all anticipation…The universities are not to be converted into Commonwealth universities. It is of great importance that they should retain their individuality and their local character and quality.”:

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Commonwealth of Australia, States Grants (Universities) Bill 1951 Second Reading Speech, House of Representatives Official Hansard, Tuesday, 27 November 1951, 2785 (Robert Menzies, Prime Minister).

132 This was described as a new era for higher education:

“The advent of the Commonwealth Government into the university field marks a new era in Australian educational work and policy.”

University of Melbourne, University of Melbourne Calendar 1951, Annual Report 1950 (University of Melbourne, 1951), 480.

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CHAPTER SIX: HEREDITY AND COMPLEXITY

Thus, in whatever direction we turn, we confront complexity. If we take research, teaching, and public service as broadly-stated missions of higher education, each becomes over time an elaborate, steadily differentiating set of expectations and tasks. If we pick upon the three categories of general higher education, advanced professional education, and research and training for research that were creatively established in a cross-national perspective by Joseph Ben-David, the outcome is the same. Each is a confused maze.

Burton Clark (1987). The problem of complexity in modern higher education.1

Introductory chapters defined the heredity of Australian higher education as the product of an integrated higher education public policy cycle. Public policy processes lead to the passing of higher education legislation that enables higher education activity to be undertaken. This activity exerts an influence over public policy processes, and the cycle is repeated. For the purposes of this dissertation, the legislation produced by this cycle is understood as a constituent part of the genetic code for higher education. This genetic code is subject to adaptive pressure and can evolve across time. This framing of heredity is consistent with Clark Kerr’s description of the university as a “mechanism held together by administrative rules and powered by money”.2 Chapter Five examined the jurisdictions in which public policy processes occur, and the influence that legislatures exert on the specific details of financing legislation. Any generalisable findings about heredity must be contextualised by legislature and the policy context in which legislation is formulated. This chapter turns attention to patterns evident in financing legislation across jurisdictions and across time.

The onset of Commonwealth financing legislation confronted a more complex set of policy challenges than state-specific financing legislation. The Commonwealth navigated diverse levels of provision across states, existing Commonwealth contributions to states through research grants and scholarships, and a constitution that conferred no powers on matters of education. A more complex and unique legislative solution was the result. The comparatively short States Grants (Universities) Act utilised a financing algorithm to customise financing to universities via the states for current and future allocations, based on past state and Commonwealth financing arrangements. The five-page States Grants Act is short and simple when juxtaposed with the complexity of legislation universities confront today, and which have their origins in 1951 legislation. The State Grants Act highlights a trend towards complexity that a better understanding of heredity must accommodate.

Burton Clark suggests complexity is a fundamental property of higher education, as the “steady accretion of realistic expectations cannot be stopped, let alone reversed”.3 Knowledge refinement, distribution and application tends towards specialisation. Disciplines such as history or economics are “inherently imperialistic”4 and will expand their boundaries of coverage geographically, conceptually and across time. This complexity of activity does not, however, mandate a parallel lock-step increase in legislative complexity.

Australia is in a league of its own for the frequency with which higher education legislation is amended.5 One might speculate as to whether this is the outcome of a federated model, and

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the Commonwealth’s challenge in navigating state differences within the constraints of the Constitution. The underlying complexity of legislation observable today, and the frequency with which it is amended, has been an important catalyst for this dissertation. The literature gives few clues as to whether this, or other explanations, have validity. It is not a truism that complexity in higher education legislation is inevitable. It is possible, for example, that the annual endowment of £5,000 established in 18506 be scaled up to align with the demands of today. Enabling legislation could simply make an annual payment of $1 billion. This would be equivalent to the University of Sydney’s support from all governments in 2016.7 This would be a less administratively complex outcome than current arrangements.

Subsequent sections describe the evolution away from fixed endowments, with emphasis on New South Wales, Victoria, Tasmania and Commonwealth legislation. The evolution from short and simple to intricate complexity is more than steady accretion. The higher education public policy cycle tends to accumulate new functions within legalisation, but, from time to time, can consolidate and streamline these functions and associated funding streams. This consolidation can coincide with more detailed descriptions of governance and accountability requirements. This pattern has been evident across multiple states, at various points in time, and in the Commonwealth’s financing legislation. The pattern has also operated in different types of legislation and across different time horizons.

EVOLUTION OF FINANCING LEGISLATION: NEW SOUTH WALES, VICTORIA AND TASMANIA, 1850 TO 1950 New South Wales – Evening Lectures

The University of Sydney began with a simple Act in 1850, including an annual endowment of £5,000 contextualised within six pages of details of purposes, powers and responsibilities. The University of Sydney Act8 of 2020 spans 41 pages, and it includes no information about endowment or revenue. The legislation evolved to utilise more precise and elaborate wording about the purposes of the university, and the powers and responsibilities of governance structures and officers. Across time, the enabling legislation ceased to be financing legislation. It instead became a more elaborate arrangement of administrative rules that ensured finances mediated by other means (private funds and public funds enabled via financing legislation) were deployed appropriately. Any evolution of the University of Sydney Act from 1950 to 2020 coincides with the onset of Commonwealth responsibility for higher education and is deliberately out of the scope for analysis. Nonetheless, the first century of the University of Sydney provides a discrete timeframe in which the steady accretion of higher education activity can be traced within a single jurisdiction.

New South Wales has adopted two key approaches to financing legislation relevant to the University of Sydney. The first approach was to amend and append legislation specifically concerned with the University of Sydney, with 30 such Acts documented across the century. The second was to utilise Appropriation Acts to allocate supplemental funds to the university for purposes of varying specificity. Appropriation Acts made specific allocations to the university in 57 years of the century 1850 to 1950. New South Wales made little use of Acts Supporting the University and Other Purposes to support the financing of the University of Sydney. Only three Acts that indirectly support the university in addition to other purposes are evident from 1850 to 1950, all of which relate to interactions between the University of Sydney and the school system.9

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The evolution of the university-specific legislation can be described as occurring across discrete bursts of activity. There was legislative activity associated with the university establishment between 1850 and 1867, with legislation focused on governance refinements,10 university land and buildings11 and residential college establishment.12 The shifting regulation of disciplines was evident with legislation exempting Arts graduates from sitting Bar exams.13 There were further amendments to the degrees that could be conferred, along with changes that allowed for the admission of women,14 and establishment of a women’s college15 in the 1880s. Each of these developments is consistent with the accretion and absorption of new expectations.

University-related legislation from 1850 to 1900 was consolidated in 1900, replacing the University of Sydney with broader reference to university and university colleges.16 This consolidated Act made clearer the impact of previous amendments, with an increase in administrative rules and word count from around 3,000 to 5,000. There was, however, no corresponding increase in endowment, which remained fixed at £5,000. By contrast, New South Wales Appropriation Acts had been supplementing the university’s finances for over two decades, and in 1900 contributed an additional £7,200 to the base endowment. These numbers may be small, almost trivial to the $2.5 billion of funding that the University of Sydney had in 2018, but they highlight important interactions between base endowment funding and annual appropriations for specific purposes.

The trend towards complexity, and accretion of specifically funded activities within legislation, is evident in both the university Act (accumulation of colleges, land and buildings) and in Appropriation Acts. The first Appropriation Act identified that directed funds to the university was in 1874, with £1,530 being a further sum to support the flooring of a hall.17 By 1900, the range of items funded through appropriations grew to include furnishings, additional endowment, evening lectures and matriculation fees.18 In the intervening years, provision was also made for interest on bequests, new disciplinary chairs, natural history specimens, medical apparatus, laboratory equipment and repairs. Additional appropriations in 1889, for example, totalled £24,120; five times higher than the base endowment.19

From 1900 to 1950, an interplay between Appropriation Act and university Act financing becomes evident. Appropriation Acts direct funding to new activities that become embedded and restated in Appropriation Acts year after year. These repeated appropriations are subsequently subsumed within the university Act through an increase in the core financing mechanism of the base endowment. Amendments to the university Act and endowment also coincide with an increase in governance changes and conditions of funding. To illustrate this process, the specific text can be found repeated in Appropriation Acts from 1887 through to 1912:

To provide for the establishment of Evening Lectures (including University Extension Lectures, and Lectures in Law).

This text is integrated within the University of Sydney Act in 1912 with minor variations:

Evening tutorial classes. 14A. The Senate shall provide for the establishment and maintenance of evening tutorial classes in science, economics, ancient and modern history and sociology, and may provide for evening tutorial classes in other subjects.20

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Following the integration of this text (and funding) within the university Act, this text was no longer included within future Appropriation Acts. This wording remained embedded within University of Sydney legislation until an amendment to the disciplines mentioned in 1973.21 This text was repealed in 1989.22 This example suggests that once a legislature determines that a new higher education function should be financed, this function can be integrated into financing legislation, and endure for a substantial period of time. In this case, specific text pertaining to extension lectures is retained for over 100 years, spanning precarious annual appropriations and core institutional requirement. It is unlikely that those involved in the introduction of this function and specific wording within an Appropriation Act would have anticipated that it would become an enduring feature of Australian higher education, within New South Wales and other states.

At the point at which evening classes were integrated within university legislation, the university’s endowment was increased from £10,000 to £20,000, and an additional six pages of text and administrative rules were inserted into the Act. This additional endowment partially offset the £26,500 funded through the 1912 Appropriation Act.23 Evening classes were one of 16 items funded by this single year time-bound appropriation. Other activities funded included Chairs in agriculture, veterinary science, economics and commerce, and botany. The latter eventually part of the department led by Eric Ashby, whose musings on heredity inspired this research.

This interaction between different forms of legislation, core financing mechanisms and special appropriations is important to the notion of heredity this dissertation seeks to define. In New South Wales, there is a proliferation of higher education appropriations that represent a public policy response to social, economic and political influences. These appropriations enable a range of higher education activities. Their proliferation generates complexity in legislation and policy that is eventually consolidated, integrated and simplified within the core financing legislation and mechanism. Once consolidated and embedded, the substantive higher education activity financed then endures across time. This integration of one-off appropriations to longer-term entitlement warrants a more robust suite of governance arrangements and conditions of funding that are progressively refined within core financing mechanisms and legislation.

This process of proliferation of appropriations and subsequent consolidation within an increased base endowment was repeated multiple times in New South Wales between 1900 and 1950. In 1902, the endowment was doubled from £5,000 to £10,000.24 This increase was a recognition that supplemental appropriations positioned the university in a precarious position in terms of budget planning. The underlying logic driving the endowment increase was articulated during the relevant bill’s second reading, and can be positioned as an institutionally centred rationale, for the university, rather than for the benefit of society or the economy, or other explanations.

We are doubling the statutory endowment; but the University has been in receipt of a statutory endowment of £5,000 and of special endowments of from £4,000 to £8,000 or £9,000 per annum. The object of the bill is, first of all, to put the University Senate in a position to be able to make all their arrangements without fear of, say, a catch vote of this House, perhaps in Committee, sometimes cutting down their special endowment.25

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The next point at which the endowment was increased was in 1912 and included the integration of evening classes, as described in passages above. Whilst subsequent chapters will explore in more depth the drivers and consequences of change, it is worth noting that the motivation for the 1912 endowment increase is positioned as social rather than institutional, and that subsequent debate highlights a critical insight of Trow, specifically that expansion of higher education opens up tensions in public funding, making it harder to sustain previous levels of per-student funding across time.26

The object of the bill is self-evident. It is to throw the doors of the University to the people of the state without preference to any class.27

For the result of this Bill, if it passes in its present condition, will be that in 1915, the Senate will have had to give up £20,000 worth of fees for which they will only get £10,000 from the Government.28

The university’s endowment was again increased in 1916,29 and highlights the process by which annual appropriations for specific purposes are integrated within the core financing instrument of the university Act endowment:

The bill provides for £20,000 to be paid to the University in connection with the upkeep, bursaries, and exhibitions. The extra £10,000 was promised … long ago … This is really putting in statutory form what has been done through the estimates.30

Whilst the second reading speech emphasised the importance of responding to social need through bursaries and exhibitions, the reality is more nuanced. It would be inaccurate to suggest that the pattern of proliferating and embedding special appropriations in university Acts is the only way in which legislation develops and evolves. For example, the 1916 amendment sees funding for a Chair in Architecture introduced into the university Act along with an endowment increase. This Chair is also evident in the Appropriation Act for the first time in 1916. Appropriation Acts had been financing Chairs in a variety of disciplines pre- and post-1916, including agriculture and veterinary science, botany, dentistry, economics and commerce, and mechanical engineering,31 but not architecture. Not all repeated annually appropriated functions were consolidated within the endowment, and new additions to the core financing mechanism were not dependent on an earlier pattern of appropriation, although often were. The integration of new content within core financing legislation is both an interplay with other financing legislation, and the product of the legislature’s mediation of various social, economic and political drivers.

The observation that items financed through annual Appropriation Acts are consolidated in the core financing instrument was observed because of the specific approach taken by the New South Wales legislature to itemise expenditure within its Appropriation Acts. The repeated pattern was identified through inductive analysis of Appropriation Acts.

The pattern of consolidation of financing is also evident in appropriations mediated by departmental allocations not explicitly documented within legislation. The increase in University of Sydney endowment in 1937 can be explained by growth in departmental funding allocations. In the preceding decade, New South Wales had become less reliant on itemised appropriations for the university. There were no mentions of the university in Appropriation Acts from 1928 to 1935. There was, however, minor provision for funding to support

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postgraduate education and “miscellaneous services and chairs” in 193632 and support for a professor in dentistry in 1937.33 The absence of Appropriation Acts is partly explained by the impact of the Depression. State capacity to fund additional activity was constrained and resulted in a reduction of what should have been a fixed annual endowment. A reduction in revenue, combined with rising enrolments and rising costs, resulted in an endowment increase from £30,000 to £100,000 as state finances recovered.

I propose now to inform the House why … increased endowment should be given to Sydney University … First, a marked increase in enrolments. Secondly, a post-war demand, of increasing severity, for the provision of costly science courses, involving heavy expenditure on staff, building, and equipment. Thirdly, notwithstanding the first and second factors, a reduction of an already inadequate endowment of the order of 20 per cent: between 1931 and 1935 in the statutory endowment, and of the order of 28 ½ per cent in the departmental votes … practically one-third of its students are admitted without fees.34

This 1936 amendment again highlights the challenges faced by public policy processes of the New South Wales legislature. The university was accumulating expectations and costs (buildings, equipment, sciences) to satisfy increasing social demand (with many on scholarships), and at a time of constrained public finances (Depression), leading to a major increase in recurrent fixed endowment. Elements of this tension were also evident in an increase in endowment in 1948. A special appropriation of £25,000 was made in 1947;35 this building on additional funds made to the university through departmental allocations. This special appropriation was consolidated into the base endowment in 1948, increasing the endowment from £100,000 to £125,000:

Since 1938, when the £100,000 was made available by the 1937 amendment, grants of additional amounts have been made as follows: In 1938 an amount of £1,000; in 1939 £1,000; and in 1940 £2,504. When this Government came into office immediate action was taken to extend further the assistance being given to the University Authorities. In 1941 the amount was £3,600, and in 1942 it rose to £19,065 … £3,600 was granted in 1943, while £79,450 was provided in 1944 ... In recent years the need for increasing the amount of statutory endowment has become evident.36

The points between 1900 and 1950 at which the endowment was increased provides a lens through which relationships between base endowment and supplemental funding can be ascertained. Tracing line item detail of Appropriation Acts highlights the specific points in time the New South Wales legislature provided seed funding for new disciplines, or advanced specific social and economic objectives. Amending legislation for the University of Sydney also highlights how these additional higher education activities are integrated into university legislation and what can be considered the primary financing mechanism. This coincides with more detailed descriptions of governance and accountability requirements. Governance-related text encodes decision-making frameworks and protocols. Governance is currently defined by TEQSA as “the framework of structures, rules, relationships, systems and processes” that a provider uses to set direction, manage risk and establish delegations.37 Whilst governance is also described in broader terms as a university’s “internal relationships, external relationships, and the intersection between them”,38 the governance text within legislation is more consistent with the TEQSA definition. Accountability text relates to clauses within legislation through which organisations, and in this case universities, can be held

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responsible for their actions.39 Accountability text can be understood from the accountability questions of: “Who is accountable to whom, for what purposes, for whose benefit, by which means, and with what consequences?”40 Text that specifies additional funding conditional on satisfying certain requirements can be understood as accountability text. Text that changes the powers or composition of a university’s governing body can by understood as governance text.

Not all governance and accountability-related changes arise in relation to endowment increases. Specific examples where governance is refined without changes to financing include clarifying governance of university colleges,41 and powers of the Vice-Chancellor.42 All of which serves to make a reading of legislation without ready access to compilations more challenging. Each new Act brings additions and deletions that must be juxtaposed with earlier additions and deletions, each serving to swell the pages of the university’s legislation. Some text is strongly conserved, however, with the example of “evening classes” first introduced in 1887 and retained as an inherited characteristic within financing legislation for over 100 years. That pattern is evident in New South Wales; however, given legislatures have been positioned as important to heredity in the preceding chapter, it is necessary to assess whether a similar pattern is evident in other states.

Victoria – Agricultural Education

In Victoria, the university Act is, like New South Wales, the primary reference point for financing. The University of Melbourne is funded through legislative endowment, and from close to the point of establishment, the endowment has been supplemented with funding through Appropriation Acts. A significant load in the financing of the University of Melbourne is managed through Appropriation Acts spanning 1854 to 1915. These appropriations, like New South Wales, allow one to see an accumulation of items funded beyond base endowment and which contribute to an increase in institutional scale and complexity. There is, however, comparatively less detail provided in the purposes of additional funds. Victoria makes repeated use of “addition to endowment” in Appropriation Acts spanning most years from 1884 to 1904.43 Notwithstanding the general nature of additional funding, there is evidence of appropriations supporting new disciplines; for example, through funding a biology school.44 The rise of science and research is also evident as appropriations supported construction of biological, chemical and mechanical laboratories.45 In some years, the quid pro quo of additional public funding was evident as the additional endowment was conditional on provision of scholarships and exhibitions.46

Like New South Wales before, Victoria’s “addition to endowment” was consolidated within the core financing mechanism of the University of Melbourne Act in 1904. This consolidation also saw an increase in governance and accountability requirements.47 The additional £11,000 in endowment required that specific disciplines (science) be taught in specific courses (mining and agriculture) and that due consideration be given to specific cohorts (entry for those who had not matriculated, and evening lectures to be available). Victoria provides evidence that a process repeated several times within New South Wales was not the quirk of a single legislature.

There are legislative developments that occur beyond base endowment and supplemental Appropriation Act funding, which can be attributed to disciplinary48 and social concerns,49 as well as refinements to the administrative rules governing university life.50 There is an accumulation of functions, disciplines and administrative rules. What is notable in the

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Victorian context is that the intermittent consolidation of financing into a cohort larger whole is repeated within both Appropriation Acts and legislation that directs funds to the university and other institutional recipients. This legislation is particularly relevant given that beyond 1915, Victorian Appropriation Acts ceased to provide any specific details of expenditure, instead making broad references to departmental appropriations that put them beyond analysis, given the research design.

Legislation supporting the university and other purposes was passed with the Agricultural Education Act 1919, through which funds were directed to state agricultural colleges and the University of Melbourne for teaching and research in agriculture. The conditions of receiving funds through this Act echo those of the 1904 endowment consolidation, and include requirements to offer scholarships and flexible admissions, as well as establishing a school of agriculture.51 The phrasing for some requirements is comparable to that utilised in 1904:

That the University will admit students to the courses for diplomas in mining and agriculture without their having passed in the full number of subjects necessary for matriculation.52 (The University Act 1904)

That the University admits students to the courses for diplomas of Agriculture without their having qualified for matriculation.53 (Agricultural Education Act 1919)

The Agricultural Education Act includes additional provisions and text that is subsequently reused in a subsequent consolidation of the university Act in 1923:

… shall in each year and from year to year provide free places admitting to full courses for degrees or diplomas.54 (Agricultural Education Act 1919)

… shall in each year provide “free places” admitting to full courses for degrees diplomas or licences.55 (University Act 1923)

This 1923 consolidation of the university Act, amendments and legislation supporting the university and other purposes has a clear and significant impact on legislative complexity. The University of Melbourne Act of 1853 spanned a mere three pages, but by 1923 had grown to 27 pages. The base endowment increased to £45,00056 as a result of this pattern of proliferation of funding streams and intermittent consolidation. There was also, however, additional conditional funding included in the university Act as it was consolidated. This replicated the financing mechanism outlined in the Agricultural Education Act. The additional grant was conditional on establishing a school of commerce,57 and undertaking research in science.58 As a pre-cursor to developments some half a century later, the 1923 university Act also established a loan fund for students.59 The significance of this Act, the process of consolidation, and the relevance to heredity is made clear in the second reading debate:

It is a Bill which is long overdue … most, of the alterations … were suggested as far back as 1902 by a Royal Commission ... Broadly speaking, the Bill deals with three important aspects of University education. The first radical alteration is in the method of governing the University. The second contemplates making financial provision for the carrying on of the work, and the third deals with the future development of the University. … The only permanent endowment which the University now has is … £9,000 for general purposes. That was long ago recognised as being quite insufficient

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… Since 1914 the University has received its endowment by the more or less precarious method of providing for its wants on the Estimates each year.60

The reference to a 1902 Royal Commission is an important contextual development that may explain differences between legislation and financing between Victoria and New South Wales. In 1901, the University of Melbourne was made aware that accountant Frederick Dickson had systematically defrauded the university of nearly £29,000 over a period of 15 years. This was nearly double the amount of the government grant for 1901.61 The Dickson affair was a contributing factor in the establishment of a Royal Commission interrogating the work and finances of the university. The Dickson affair cast a long shadow over the university and its financing. The explicit conditions of grants and stringent governance conditions described in the Agricultural Education Act 1919, and similar multipurpose legislation, may be understood within this context.

Claims made about complexity and the heredity of higher education emerging from the New South Wales legislature are affirmed by the Victorian experience, although there are clear and significant differences in approach associated with jurisdictional context. Before considering examples from other jurisdictions, it is worth taking stock of the relevance of previous sections for heredity and its relationship with complexity. The intricate details of higher education legislation across time, and across jurisdictions, are difficult and exhausting to hold in mind at any point in time. The select examples provided demonstrate proliferating state-funded activity. This is evident in line item detail of New South Wales Appropriation Acts, and legislation funding the University of Melbourne and agricultural colleges in Victoria. There is a subsequent consolidation of individually financed items within university Acts within the core university endowment. This broad interpretation of changes in legislative detail is supported by the espoused rationale for consolidated legislation documented within Hansard by relevant ministers during second reading debates.

The heredity process operates with broad consistency across at least two jurisdictions, with jurisdiction-specific nuance in the way new higher education activity is funded and consolidated. Additional, more stable resourcing comes with concurrent changes to governance and accountability. Consistent with the DNA metaphor of heredity, macro patterns around the financing of new activities result in specific legislative text that is reused, apparently borrowed from other jurisdictions and other points in time. The intermittent consolidation of publicly funded activities coincides with more substantial governance and accountability requirements that produces more complex legislation. This relationship between public policy and higher education cycles and more complex forms of legislation is depicted in Figure 8.

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Figure 8. Heredity and Complexity in New South Wales and Victoria, 1850 to 1950

The Tasmanian Contribution

Analysis of the origins of higher education financing legislation in Chapter Five made it evident that Tasmania was different to the mainland. Tasmania was the only legislature to have adopted scholarships to support higher education as a precursor to establishing a university. By the end of the first century of Australian higher education, Tasmania was also distinctive for the small scale of enrolments and higher education provision. Table 6, on page 93, highlights that 1950 enrolments at the University of Tasmania were the smallest in the nation. A mere 7% of those of the largest – University of Sydney – and 36% of the second-smallest university – the University of Western Australia. Tasmania therefore provides a means of assessing whether the trend to complexity in financing legislation is a function of scale of activity, or independent and common to all jurisdictions.

Whilst the scale of Tasmanian higher education is small when compared to Sydney and Melbourne, there is evidence of significant policy activity occurring between 1858 and 1950. Six items of scholarship legislation were passed between 1858 and 1887, demonstrating a small but not insignificant responsiveness to the needs of Tasmanians.62 The inclusion of references to scholarships within the 1887 Appropriation Act is the first in a long and repeated series of appropriations that demonstrate similarities to events in both New South Wales and Victoria. Mentions to the financing of higher education were identified in Tasmanian Appropriation Acts spanning 55 of the next 64 years.63

A process of growth in supplemental expenditure was revealed in granular detail through Appropriation Acts of New South Wales. In Victoria, supplemental expenditure took the form of legislation supporting the university and other purposes. Supplemental expenditure was intermittently integrated within the university Act in both jurisdictions, with concurrent increases in text describing governance and accountability requirements. This process was

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exemplified in both jurisdictions by examination of references to mechanisms to advance access to higher education through scholarships and extension lectures and tutorials. Tasmania adopted a near-identical approach, albeit with jurisdiction-specific nuance in the form of the Tasmanian “contribution”.

From 1887 to 1912, New South Wales Appropriations Acts included provision for evening lectures; this provision was ultimately integrated into the university Act.64 In Tasmania, the first reference to evening lectures is found in the 1913 Appropriation Act. It is plausible that this was motivated by wishing to emulate developments in mainland universities. At this point, the University of Tasmania received a “contribution” of £5,500, of which £4,000 was reserved by law by the legislated endowment. An additional £500 was “conditional on provision being made for Extension, and Tutorial Classes for Non-Matriculated Students.”65 This specific text is repeated in subsequent Appropriation Acts each year until 1935.

In 1935, the University of Tasmania endowment was increased from £4,000 to £10,00066, and thereafter reference to the state’s “contribution” or conditional appropriations within Appropriation Acts disappears. The 1935 Appropriation Act makes a contribution of £12,618; £4,000 of which was reserved by law, and a grant of £641 was conditional on extension classes, outreach in the Northern Districts and funding of the Secretary for Workers’ Educational Association.67

Like New South Wales before, legislative text supporting extension classes was introduced, then repeated year on year until such time that the funding was absorbed into the university’s core financing mechanism. This repeats a pattern observed in larger universities and jurisdictions, although with differences in the time across which the pattern is evident. Whilst this is what occurred, developments in Tasmanian financing legislation between 1913 and 1935 are more complex than a straightforward consolidation in the core financing instrument, warranting additional analysis and interpretation.

From 1912 to 1935, University of Tasmania funding “reserved by law” through endowment was static at £4,000. The university received additional funding in the form of a state “contribution” (a proportion of which was “reserved in law”), and conditional funding. The difference between the core endowment and “Tasmanian contribution” interacted with a proliferation of funded activities. These additional activities were consolidated in the Tasmanian contribution rather than university endowment. The Tasmanian contribution was then eventually consolidated in the university endowment. This pattern is somewhat difficult to convey, but is described below with attempted, but not perfect, clarity.

The 1916 Appropriation Act saw the state’s contribution retained at £5,500, but the amount for extension classes had increased to £800. A further £700 was “conditional on further Scholarships being awarded”.68 In 1917, the state contribution integrated that which was previously conditional into a larger state contribution of £6,325.69 Discrete conditional allocations for extension classes and scholarships were consolidated into a single allocation of £675. The text made this £675 conditional on both extension classes and scholarships. In addition, a further £350 was “conditional on the appointment of a Lecturer to carry on Tutorial and Extension Work in the Northern Districts”.70 The net effect from 1916 to 1917 was an increase in “contribution” of £825, and a decrease in conditional funding of £475. A proportion of that which was funded conditionally was integrated in what was emerging as the core

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financing mechanism of the Tasmanian state “contribution”, which extended beyond the legislated and guaranteed endowment.

In subsequent years, conditional financing proliferated, and was again integrated within the state “contribution”. Discrete appropriations were made in 1919 for the state contribution (£7,825) and conditional grants relating to extension and tutorial classes (£675), tutorial and extension work in the Northern Districts (£350), and expenses of Secretary for Workers’ Educational Association (£250 and £33).71 In 1920, the state contribution increased to £10,125, and conditional grants increased to £2,105 with the text of previously discrete appropriations condensed into a single line item.72 The broad relationship between state contribution (around £10,000) and consolidated conditional funding (around £2,000) was then retained until 1935, at which point additional funding was consolidated in the university’s endowment as it increased from £4,000 to £10,000.73

Funding of tens or hundreds of pounds for specific purposes made a century ago could be interpreted as mere historical curio and of trivial significance. The novel introduction of legislative text to support £350 of engagement with the Northern Districts is, however, emblematic of a long-term policy concern. Hundreds of millions are now being spent on a City Deal for Launceston and a Northern Transformation Project, changing the way the University of Tasmania delivers higher education in the Northern Districts.74 This is in addition to millions spent on discrete projects targeting university engagement in Northern Tasmania.75 The antecedents of this can be found in 1917, and like financing legislation spanning 1910s and 1930s, may well find a way of being integrated in the University of Tasmania’s core financing.

The Tasmanian “contribution” is more than a trivial anecdote for heredity and complexity. New South Wales and Victoria saw a proliferation of specific appropriations integrated within the university Act, coinciding with a more complex description of governance and accountability within the university Act. Tasmania has seen a proliferation of appropriations integrated within the state “contribution” listed within the Appropriation Act. This provided little impetus to clarify and refine governance and accountability requirements for the University of Tasmania. When the university Act was eventually amended,76 and endowment increased from £4,000 to £10,000, the net effect was modest. Whilst this coincided with governance-related changes that redefined the constitution of Council, there was no substantive change in the volume of legislative text that arose. There was no requirement that the increased endowment be directed towards extension classes, or Northern Districts outreach or other functions previously specified in Appropriation Acts. The smaller scale of activities, and consolidation of appropriated activities within the state “contribution”, weakened any adaptive pressure for the Tasmanian legislature to ensure that a higher amount “reserved by law” was subject to more sophisticated governance and public accountability expectations. The Tasmanian contribution suggests that the integrated public policy and higher education cycle will still generate financing legislation, but without a sufficient scale or variety in functions subject to public financing, the impetus for legislative complexity is reduced. This Tasmanian-specific relationship between public policy, higher education and legislative complexity is represented in Figure 9.

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Figure 9. Heredity and Complexity in Tasmania, 1889 to 1935

EVOLUTION OF COMMONWEALTH FINANCING LEGISLATION, 1951 TO 2020

Previous sections have documented the role of three state legislatures in accumulating publicly funded higher education activities within financing legislation. Each of these legislatures has intermittently consolidated the proliferation of individually financed activities within a core financing mechanism. Where the scale and complexity of publicly funded activity is high, the consolidation of funded activities can coincide with the introduction of more complicated governance and accountability requirements. The heredity of higher education from these state legislatures involves two forms of complexity: an increase in the variety of activity that is financed, and complexity of administrative rules that are associated with this financing. Attention now turns to the Commonwealth to understand whether heredity processes produce complexity for similar reasons.

By any measure, the scale and complexity of Australian higher education increases dramatically after World War II. There is a sharp change in patterns of enrolment growth pre and post war. Pre-war growth in higher education was broadly in line with population growth; post war saw participation in higher education rise rapidly.77 Participation in higher education shifted from Trow’s elite categorisation to mass and now near-universal levels.78 The growth in system scale and complexity is paralleled in higher education legislation, such that the legislative and policy context that universities now operate within is extraordinarily complicated. It is not feasible to approach the evolution of Commonwealth financing with a similar approach to that deployed for the states. The discrete line-by-line accretion of detail can be managed in legislation with page lengths of single digits, but it is more challenging with legislation spanning 500 or more pages.

To manage the challenge of tracing the evolution of Commonwealth legislation, three approaches are taken. First, the mechanism adopted by the Commonwealth in the design of

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higher education financing legislation from 1951 to 1988 is broadly consistent. States’ grants allocated to universities were utilised from 1951 through to 1977. States’ grants of similar design were directed to teachers’ colleges and colleges of advanced education from 1965 to 1977. States’ grants directed to tertiary education were utilised from 1977 to 1988. The shift from university to advanced education and tertiary education coincided with shifting policy preferences across this timeframe, such as the introduction of the binary system. There was, however, a consistent approach to the framing of legislation in the form of States Grants Acts that suggests they form a new legislation sub-system. This sub-system allows one to acknowledge broad developments in higher education, whilst focusing more specifically on the complexity of both activity and administrative rules described within the university, advanced education and tertiary education variants of States Grants Acts.

Second, the introduction of the Higher Education Financing Authority (HEFA) marked an important pivot in the design of the core financing mechanism, which warrants consideration. States Grants Acts were titled as such because payments were made to states on the proviso that funding would be passed on to higher education institutions. HEFA, by contrast, is titled as such because of a focus on funding higher education and payments to providers. This aligned the legislation with practice that had occurred since the referral of powers for higher education to the Commonwealth in the early ’70s but cut out the state as the intermediary for funding. At the point of assent, HEFA retained the mechanism of payments to the states,79 but a 1992 amendment allowed the minister to direct funds to institutions directly.80 The transition to HEFA and direct payments to institutes constitutes a new legislative sub-system. HEFA makes for a significant shift in financing mechanism that brings the Dawkins reforms into existence, yet has attracted little attention in the literature, and even when seeking to document and explore the magnitude of the Dawkins reform era, the legislation takes a back seat to analysis.81 Similarities and differences between the preceding State Grants Acts and HEFA allows for the model of heredity to be tested. The analysis will seek to demonstrate which, if any, characteristics of Commonwealth financing legislation were retained pre and post 1988.

Third, the Dawkins reforms and the unified national system have been largely retained for some three decades. HEFA defines the legislative commencement of the Dawkins reforms. In 2020 it is HESA and its 500+ pages of detail that shapes the financing of the sector. The final approach to exploring the trend towards complexity isolates elements of HESA relevant to its purposes and the definition of fees, and traces their lineage from the purposes of higher education articulated in the initial State Grants Act of 1951 through to HEFA and amendments made within HESA to the current day.

States Grants and Related Acts Schedules, 1951 to 1988

Features of the States Grants (Universities Act) 195182 were described on page 93 of Chapter Five. The Act allocated funding on the basis of a deceptively simple table that integrated an algorithm combining reference to earlier Commonwealth funding, state funding and new funding for universities and residential colleges. Neither guaranteed endowment nor potentially precarious annual appropriation, and the Act made provision for three years of funding from 1951 to 1953.83 The next iteration of States Grants Acts in 195384 repealed the 1951 Act, although ostensibly copied verbatim a significant proportion of legislative detail, including student fees and university purposes. What did change was the deletion of reference to the Commonwealth Reconstruction Training Scheme and a two-year rather than three-year

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funding horizon. This was, however, an anomaly, and subsequent iterations generally articulated grants for various purposes on a triennial basis. The algorithm to distribute funding shifted accordingly with grants calculated on the basis of a 25%:75% share of funding between Commonwealth and state, without adjustment for other Commonwealth grants. A single table was included in the Act that embedded this revised algorithm.

The format of the 1953 Act was replicated in 1955, 1956 and 1957. The details of legislative text were reused, with the most striking change that of an increase in the scale of funding made available. The Murray report on Australian universities highlighted that Commonwealth contributions across these States Grants Acts doubled from £1,103,000 in 1951 to £2,300,000 in 1957,85 responding to a marked increase in student participation. The report projected further increased demand and the need for an urgent Commonwealth response. Subsequent years saw Murray report recommendations integrated within legislation, whilst maintaining the core features of legislative text first described in 1951. The definition of student fees was identical across States Grants Acts spanning 1951 to that which implements Murray report findings in 1958.86 The definition of university purposes was also retained across time, with subtle refinement of wording of courses of study.

The implementation of Murray report recommendations within legislation paralleled developments in university funding through state legislatures over the preceding century. Rather than simply dialling up the quantum of funds directed to universities in the table-based algorithm, as was the case in earlier years, additional funding was directed to universities through additional funding streams. This was akin to the proliferating list of items in state Appropriation Acts. The 1958 States Grants (Universities) Act marks a turning point at which a proliferation of appropriations for higher education activities became normalised in Commonwealth financing legislation. The Act specified funding for the years 1958 to 1960, spanning emergency grants for recurrent expenditure, general grants for recurrent expenditure, university building projects and grants for residential college buildings.

Subsequent States Grants (Universities) Acts provide detailed evidence of the accumulation of specific items funded by the Commonwealth. In 1958, for example, line-by-line detail was provided for Commonwealth and state contributions towards 44 discrete building projects.87 By 1960,88 this number had grown to over 100, and a new schedule was introduced to fund equipment. By 1962, a new schedule was introduced for grants for teaching hospital building projects in excess of 200, with grants ranging from trivial (£50 for data projectors) to substantial (£250,000 for teaching buildings).89

Thankfully, the level of detail in Commonwealth financing legislation has not been retained. Like the streamlining of content evident in the states during the sector’s foundational era, Commonwealth grants have been consolidated and streamlined. Later sections will demonstrate how this consolidation coincided with a rise in conditions of funding and stronger governance and accountability. The rising complexity of activities funded, and quantum of funds made available through the Commonwealth, demonstrates that more administrative rules are a function of both accumulation of public funds and the opportunities presented by consolidating public funds. The introduction of grants for teaching hospital projects is a clear example of this point. Two pages of conditions of funding relating to hospital projects are inserted into the States Grants Act, delineating the boundaries between what can and cannot be funded, and allowing for funds to be paid in instalments on the basis of advice from the

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Australian Universities Commission. The Commission itself was a form of additional governance and accountability established in 1959 to furnish the minister with advice on the “conditions upon which any financial assistance should be granted”.90

Not all Commonwealth financing Acts between 1951 and 1988 were variations of, or titled as, “States Grants”. The 1960s saw University Assistance Acts91 introduced in 1963 and 1969, supplementing funding allocated through the States Grants Acts. Without deviating from analysis of rising complexity, the legislative text of the University Assistance Acts was reused from that of contemporaneous States Grants Acts. They adopted definitions of student fees identical to that of the 1951 Act, and university purposes were also copied, although with further refinement of how courses are understood. Legislative text was borrowed and moved seamlessly between Acts. The funding schedules of the 1963 Assistance Act were also analogous to the States Grants Acts, with allocations categorised by general grants for recurrent expenditure, grants for university building projects listed in detail from trivial to substantial, and grants for residential college buildings. Within this Act, there were also grants for special research projects.92 The progressive increase in schedules financing specific recurrent expenditure, buildings and equipment coincided with a progressive increase in administrative rules. These rules refined and matured conditions of funding. This included the first iteration of university assistance legislation in 1963 that introduced conditions that states repay the Commonwealth if they failed to meet funding conditions.93

A pattern is repeated year after year in which financing legislation describes more higher education activity, with more elaborate text describing the mechanisms by which financing will operate governance and accountability requirements. The legislation absorbs and embodies the policy recommendations of Murray and Martin, the transferal of funding responsibility from states to the Commonwealth, and the birth and maturation of the binary system. Key characteristics of financing legislation are oblivious to the rise of intermediary bodies of the Australian Universities Commission, the Australian Commission of Advanced Education, and Tertiary Education Commission. Table 7 highlights the progressive accumulation of funding schedules and administrative rules guiding their distribution in legislation that finances universities, advanced education and tertiary education.

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Table 7. Accumulation of Activity in Select Financing Legislation, 1951 to 1984

Legislation Pages Schedules Select Purposes of Funding Schedules

Universities

States Grants (Universities) Act 195194

5 1 State and Commonwealth contributions, residential colleges

States Grants (Universities) Act 195895

15 4 Recurrent expenditure Building grants

Universities Assistance Act (1963)96

19 4 Special research purposes

Universities Assistance Act (1966)97

31 6 Teaching hospital projects Teaching hospital recurrent expenditure

States Grants (Universities) Act 1973 (No 2) (No 3)98

24

3

2

9 Grants for equipment Students in need Grants for social work training

Colleges of Advanced Education

States Grants (Advanced Education) (1965)99

3 1 College buildings

States Grants (Advanced Education) Act (1974)100

61 7

Recurrent expenditure Approved projects Colleges Non-government teachers colleges Staff training Relevant factors

Tertiary Education

States Grants (Tertiary Education Assistance) Act 1977101

121 20

Universities (special purposes, minor works) Colleges of advanced education (buildings) Technical and further education (staff training in data processing, adult education)

States Grants (Tertiary Education Assistance) Act 1984102

162 28 Special courses in technical education Non-government business colleges

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The model of heredity explored in this dissertation suggests that legislation and legislative text is a legislature-mediated response to complex social, economic and political forces. The activities funded by legislation become embedded in the fabric of the system, and the legislative text is replicated as legislation is remade, amended or reused within and between legislation. To illustrate the legitimacy of this proposition, one can examine specific elements of legislation, such as the definition of a student fee, and assess whether text has been conserved across time, and track how text has evolved and mutated across time. Comparative analysis of the definition of a student fee in the States Grants Acts of 1951 and 1984 follows. Text that is retained remains in plain text, text that is either deleted or additional to the 1951 definition is depicted in light grey:

… “fees” means tuition, examination, matriculation and other fees payable to a University by a student enrolled at or applying for enrolment at the University in connexion with his course of study or attendance at the University, and includes fees payable to the University in respect of the conferring of a degree or diploma, but does not include fees the payment of which is voluntary and fees payable to an organization of students …

States Grants (Universities) Act 1951 (Cth)103

Three decades later, and through multiple legislative iterations, much of the 1951 definition is retained:

… “fees”, in relation to a relevant institution, means tuition, examination or other fees payable to the relevant institution by a student enrolled at, or applying for enrolment at, the relevant institution in connection with a course of study or attendance at the relevant institution, and includes fees payable to the relevant institution in respect of the granting of a degree, diploma or other award (including a qualification relating to a trade, technical or other skilled occupation) but does not include-(a) fees the payment of which is voluntary; (b) fees payable in respect of an organization of students, …

States Grants (Tertiary Education Assistance) Act 1984 (Cth)104

The 1984 definition of a fee also includes additional clauses spanning (a) to (f), demonstrating both fidelity to the original wording first enacted in 1951, and how it is remoulded for contextual relevance with the accumulation of additional funded purposes across time.

None of the details outlined above give a particularly novel insight into developments in Australian higher education. Growth in participation and financing are well-documented facts. The influence of the Murray and Martin reviews of higher education have been dissected and evaluated at length.105 Comparative analysis of legislation pagination is a straightforward undertaking. What has not been extensively explored in the literature is the replication and accumulation of legislative detail, the underlying drivers of this phenomena, and cyclical consolidation of details evident across time. This consolidation was evident in New South Wales, Victoria and Tasmania, and, as the next section will demonstrate, also occurred in the Commonwealth, although on an elongated time horizon.

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Higher Education Funding Act 1988

Peak complexity of schedules in States Grants Acts is evident in the States Grants (Tertiary Education Assistance) Act 1984,106 with funding spread across 28 discrete funding schedules encompassing university-specific grants, higher education grants targeting colleges of advanced education, and non-higher education-related purposes of technical and further education. Whilst this dissertation examines legislation in more detail than other higher education policy studies, it is recognised that legislation is a means to an end. By 1988, system objectives were not being well served. A review of efficiency and effectiveness of Australian higher education described the associated challenges.107

Funding for higher education in the decade following referral of funding responsibility from the states to the Commonwealth from 1974 coincided with a period of challenging economic circumstances. From 1975 to 1985, enrolments increased by one-third, with no change in real government expenditure.108 Growth in student enrolments was largely achieved within colleges of advanced education, and by 1986 were seen as a full partner to universities.109 The Review of Efficiency and Effectiveness provided a springboard for a green110 and white paper111 process providing the platform for Cabinet submissions,112 which ultimately led to HEFA in 1988 and a series of amendments in subsequent years to enact the policy agenda.

The policy reference points of reviews of efficiency, green and white papers, and Cabinet submissions pay cursory attention to the evolving characteristics of the States Grants Acts. Where there is reference to the State Grants Acts, it is about the underlying intent of the funding mechanism. Block grants formed on a time-bound and generally triennial basis first established in 1951 are portrayed as impeding longer-term planning.113 The triennial grant planning process was paused in 1987 to support the transition to a new approach.114 The policy consolidation process attracted a high degree of engagement and over 600 submissions.115 HEFA is the culmination of this process, introduced to parliament in November 1988, for implementation in 1989. Minister Dawkins stated during the second reading speech for the Bill that the reform “is one of the most substantial in the history of Australia’s higher education system”.116 The long-term legacy is indisputable, but the legislative detail remains under-scrutinised.

HEFA introduced the groundbreaking Higher Education Contribution Scheme, and, as such, established connections to and amended taxation-related legislation. This is not the only external legislation that HEFA intersects with, and the long list of Acts warrants an uncharacteristic expression of gratitude to those responsible for drafting the legislation.117 The preceding States Grants Act by comparison referenced only three items of legislation.118 The items of legislation cited in HESA are repeated for full effect below:

• Acts Interpretation Act 1901 • Administrative Appeals Tribunal Act 1975 • Audit Act 1901 • Australian National University Act 1946 • Canberra College of Advanced Education Act 1967 • Commonwealth Inscribed Stock Act 1911 • Employment, Education and Training Act 1988 • Fringe Benefits Tax Assessment Act 1986

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• Income Tax Assessment Act 1936 • Maritime College Act 1978 • Overseas Students Charge Act 1979 • States Grants (Nurse Education Transfer Assistance) Act 1985 • States Grants (Technical and Further Education Assistance) Act 1988 • States Grants (Tertiary Education Assistance) Act 1984 • States Grants (Tertiary Education Assistance) Act 1987 • Taxation Administration Act 1953 • Taxation (Interest on Overpayments) Act 1983

This new higher education financing mechanism represents a new form of progress towards complexity. Tentacles to taxation legislation are a distinctive feature of HEFA, but relevant to the research thesis is the collapse and removal of 28 funding schedules of preceding legislation. HEFA amends seven discrete schedules within the States Grants Act that it supersedes, but in 1989 there is no longer a funding schedule associated with the Act. In the place of detailed funding schedules specifying amounts per institution per category of grant, HEFA introduces categories of grant. These categories of grant specify the maximum amount available, leaving considerable discretion for the minister in their distribution. HEFA grants span a variety of purposes (including special research, Aboriginal participation and equal opportunity) of “such amount as the Minister determines”, and against proposals “the Minister may approve”.119 This phrasing is not new, and is first utilised within the States Grants (Universities) Act (No 2) 1974. What is new is that this phrasing is used across all categories of grants. Itemised allocations are consolidated in the larger maximum grant amount and associated guidelines distribution mechanisms.

If legislative complexity was intermittently consolidated within state legislation across its first century, this passage of HEFA provides evidence that the consolidation process also occurs within the Commonwealth’s domain, albeit over a long time series. HEFA is, however, less “consolidation of funding within an existing model” and more the “radical remaking of higher education financing legislation with an entirely new model”. The legislature, with support of legislation drafters, cleared the table to remake and rewrite how higher education would be funded.

Close examination of specific clauses of HEFA make it clear, however, that there is a direct connection to the States Grants Acts. HEFA reuses text from the 1984 States Grants Act, and by extension includes text first drafted in 1951. Similar to the depiction of the definition of student fees between 1951 and 1984 on page 121, the extract from HEFA below highlights deletions (strikethrough) and additions (underlined) from the States Grants (Tertiary Education Assistance) Act 1984, described in passages above:

… “fees”, in relation to an institution, means tuition, examination or other fees payable to the relevant institution by a student enrolled at, or applying for enrolment at, the relevant institution in connection with a course of study or attendance at the relevant institution, and includes fees payable to the relevant institution in respect of the granting of a degree, diploma, associate diploma or other award (including a qualification relating to a trade, technical or other skilled occupation)but does not

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include: (a) fees the payment of which is voluntary; (b) fees payable in respect of an organisation of students …120

Characteristics from simple legislation spanning five pages made some 37 years earlier are retained, and from a heredity perspective have been transmitted across time and multiple forms of legislation, accumulating new additions and amendments at various points of the journey. HEFA remains on the statutes, and whilst now secondary to the Higher Education Support Act, and a candidate for repeal, the definition of a fee remains intact. The definition of a fee stretches from the inheritance of the States Grants (Universities) Act 1951 to HEFA 2020; some 69 years and counting. This process is represented in Figure 10. The processes that push States Grants to more schedules, more pages and more administrative rules have continued and have influenced a consolidation of funding tables into categories of grant evident in HEFA and HESA.

Figure 10. Heredity and Complexity, Commonwealth, 1951 to 2020

MORE OR LESS: THE EVOLVING OBJECTIVES OF AUSTRALIAN HIGHER EDUCATION

The complexity evident in HEFA and HESA makes comprehensive textual analysis unwieldy. As with analysis of the definition of student fees, there is utility in isolating specific clauses and tracing their origins and heritability. This section considers the text describing the purposes of universities spanning 1850 to HEFA and HESA.

The University of Sydney was established by the New South Wales legislature for purposes of “useful knowledge” and the pursuit of a regular and liberal course of education. In the establishment of other universities, some jurisdictions emulated Sydney, while others, like Victoria, found their own meaning in “sound learning”. Those established around the midpoint of the 20th century adopted the language of the modern research university and specialised in training and research. Subsequent amendments to university Acts of establishment have converged on the teaching and research activity definition, often contextualised by the ends

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that this activity serves.121 The University of Sydney has long since lost a mission to advance religion and morality, if ever such a mission was seriously pursued122. The university of today promotes “scholarship, research, free inquiry, the interaction of research and teaching, and academic excellence”.123 The university retains non-discriminatory and non-sectarian commitments that no religious tests will be applied for admission.124 As the University of Sydney enters its 170th year of existence, the perpetual intent is being realised, albeit with a purpose, scale and scope that has evolved in ways that would be unrecognisable and unimaginable to its colonial founders.

Recent policy consultation in relation to categories of higher education institution has entrenched the teaching and research basis of a university, whilst lifting the bar of research activity and impact.125 The consultation also proposes the category of “university college”, for which there are no research requirements, and which may unsettle the established order. Teaching functions have been present since the genesis of the system in 1850, and research purposes of universities have been integrated in university Acts since 1909, with the establishment of the University of Queensland126 and amendment to the University of Melbourne Act.127 The States Grants (Universities) Act 1951 included no statement of intent nor outcome arising from Commonwealth financing, but does include a general definition of legitimate activities that can be financed by the Commonwealth:

… “university purposes” means the general teaching and research purposes of a University in connexion with University courses and includes external tuition for University courses.128

As States Grants Acts grew in complexity across time, this definition, with minor points of clarification was retained. Courses included external courses, and funding could also be directed towards preparation of courses.129 Defining university purposes by what money could be spent on led to some curious augmentation, such as building projects and land acquisition below a specified threshold.130 Indeed, it is this definition that was retained within States Grants Acts up until 1987 and formed the basis of university purposes utilised within HEFA in 1988.

Higher Education Funding Act 1988

Like States Grants Acts before, HEFA included no statement of intent, but did include definitions of the purposes of legitimate expenditure, albeit without reference to universities. HESA defines “Limited operating purposes”, and “operating purposes” consistent with purposes for teaching first outlined in 1951, splitting out research (and buildings and equipment) as a distinct clause for operating purposes.131

It was not until 1992 that a statement of system-wide objectives was encoded within HEFA. This does not imply there were no objectives to earlier Commonwealth financing legislation, just that objectives were not explicitly articulated within legislation. Dawkins’ second reading speech for HEFA articulated the intent for this legislation. The Murray and Martin reports made clear the underlying intent of related policy reforms. In each, there was an economic and social imperative to expand access to higher education and upskill the Australian population. This imperative was not explicitly integrated within specific financing legislation of HEFA or preceding States Grants Acts, nor legislation establishing intermediary bodies such as the Australian Universities Commission, and the Tertiary Education Commission.

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Since 1951, and for some 40 years thereafter, Commonwealth financing legislation adopted a definition of university purposes characterised by what it considered permissible activities. This changed in 1992 as explicit objects, or purposes, were introduced into HEFA.132 This was portrayed as an accountability measure by the government in the context of broader changes to the system, including provision for the Commonwealth to fund universities directly.133 Subsequent parliamentary debate highlights the utility of a statement of purpose. Members of the opposition critiqued the Bill on the basis that the proposed changes failed to align with the following objectives:134

The objects of this Act are:

(a) to support a higher education system that:

(i) is characterised by quality, diversity and equity of access; and

(ii) contributes to the development of cultural and intellectual life in Australia; and

(iii) is appropriate to meet Australia’s social and economic needs for a more highly educated and skilled population; and

(b) to strengthen Australia’s knowledge base and enhance the contribution of Australia’s research capabilities to national economic development and international competitiveness and the attainment of social goals.135

No antecedents or earlier examples of this phrasing have been identified. These objects of HEFA represented a new framing of higher education financing legislation, extending beyond mere administrative rules of what it was permissible to spend money on. The development of “cultural and intellectual life” is more aligned with Sydney’s advancement of morality than a dry statement of allowable “building projects”. HEFA’s objects are a succinct and comprehensive statement of the best that higher education can be, and it is no surprise that legislative drafters emulated this content for HESA. What was included within HESA Objects makes for an interesting case study of the trend to complexity, and inherent complexity of the policy process.

Higher Education Support Act 2003

The Higher Education Support Act, or HESA, emerged from a review of higher education and extensive consultation. The block grant model in place since 1951 – States Grants Acts – was replaced with the Commonwealth Grants Scheme. The Higher Education Contribution Scheme introduced by Dawkins was refined and renamed as the Higher Education Loan Program. Performance funding and incentives were also introduced. These were not insignificant reforms, and, like HEFA before, necessitated a rewrite of the primary funding legislation, rather than minor targeted edits.

The Explanatory Memorandum136 associated with the Higher Education Support Bill 2003 provides an overview of the proposed Act and maintains the objects of HEFA verbatim. The Bill that was tabled in parliament, however, maintained the objects of HEFA with one specific change: the word ‘more’ was deleted from the phrase “to meet Australia’s social and economic needs for a more highly educated and skilled population”.137 The precise motivation for this change is unclear but it was a departure from the text of the Explanatory Memorandum. Plausible interpretations are that the tautological phrasing of “more highly”

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was seen as redundant and simplified, or that there was deliberate intervention to soften the outlook for future growth in the system.

The extent of reforms implicit in HESA were strongly contested,138 with specific concerns raised about introduction of full-fee undergraduate places and support for other higher education providers. This was seen as a pathway to full-fee liberalisation.139 A net result of the parliamentary process was content inserted into the objects of HESA to affirm the distinctive role of universities. The new text below was introduced into the Bill, with political disagreement contributing to its complexity:

(b) to support the distinctive purposes of universities, which are:

(i) the education of persons, enabling them to take a leadership role in the intellectual, cultural, economic and social development of their communities; and

(ii) the creation and advancement of knowledge; and

(iii) the application of knowledge and discoveries to the betterment of communities in Australia and internationally;

recognising that universities are established under laws of the Commonwealth, the States and the Territories that empower them to achieve their objectives as autonomous institutions through governing bodies that are responsible for both the university’s overall performance and its ongoing independence; and…

(d) to support students undertaking higher education.

Irrespective of any normative opinion on the merits of the HEFA objects or HESA objects, the underlying pattern is one of accumulation of content. This accumulation proceeds with later amendments to HESA in 2007 and 20011 in which objects are augmented with the text below:

(e) to support students undertaking higher education and certain vocational education and training140

Higher Education Support Amendment (Extending Fee-Help for Vet Diploma, Advanced Diploma, Graduate Diploma and Graduate Certificate Courses) Act 2007 (Cth)

(a)(iv) promotes and protects free intellectual inquiry in learning, teaching and research141

Higher Education Support Amendment (Demand Driven Funding System and Other Measures) Act 2011 (Cth)

The 2011 amendment enshrines intellectual freedom; a topic that has been the area of considerable recent interest with a review into university freedom of speech.142 The 2007 amendment extends higher education support to vocational education. This inclusion of vocational education parallels cycles of the past as higher education absorbs or is integrated with other forms of post-compulsory education. The extensive list of schedules spanning universities, advanced colleges of education and technical and further education in States Grants (Tertiary Education) replicated within HESA as an extensive list of higher education loan

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programs spanning HECS HELP, FEE-HELP and VET FEE-HELP. This proliferation of activities coincides with the proliferation of stated objects of the legislation.

Commonwealth higher education financing has evolved from statements of permitted expenditure to statements of why higher education is financed. There is an intermittent accumulation of text (and rare attempted deletions) responding to the specific context of the Commonwealth at various points in time. The purposes of higher education have trended to complexity; a sparse 25 words of the States Grants Act in 1951, tripled to 85 words with an amendment to HESA, and more than doubled to 209 words in the HESA of today. Each additional phrase and amendment is the product of a legislative process, at times deliberate and transparent, as was the case with HEFA, and at times opaque and politicised, as was the case with HESA.

HEREDITY AND COMPLEXITY SUMMARY OF FINDINGS

This chapter has explored the relationship between heredity and complexity. Higher education’s accumulation of activities is well documented. This accumulation might expect one to see a steady increase in the legislative detail that enables this proliferation of activity. Indeed, the short and succinct financing Acts of the past have all grown in their complexity. What is not well documented is the cyclical consolidation of distinct and separate funding streams into a core financing instrument. This consolidation is observed across multiple states in the foundational era legislative sub-system, and in the Commonwealth’s States Grants legislative sub-system of the post-war era.

This proliferation and consolidation cycle operates on a long time horizon; the proliferation and collapse of States Grants Acts funding schedules spanning 40 years. The current legislative sub-system of the unified national system continues to accrue legislative text as it proliferates and integrates new functions and activities; a process that may continue for decades.

The intermittent consolidation often coincides with an increase in conditions of funding in governance and accountability requirements. The increase in governance and accountability is not dependent on consolidation, and it can happen independently. The process of proliferation and consolidation is not a golden rule but an observable repeated pattern.

The net result of the heredity process is a shift towards more complex legislation, depicted in Figure 11. This was observed in multiple states and the Commonwealth. There is, however, a notable exception with Tasmanian legislation remaining reasonably succinct within the period of analysis. The consolidation of publicly funded activity within a secondary financing mechanism, and overall low level of public funding, suggests that adaptive pressure must cross a threshold before necessitating the attention of policy makers and creation of more elaborate administrative rules.

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Figure 11. An Integrated View of Heredity and Complexity

The trend to complexity can be assessed from multiple perspectives: increasing items of financing legislation; line items in Appropriation Acts; schedules within legislation; and increasing clauses and word counts to define student fees and system objectives. This complexity stems from the integrated policy and higher education cycle that is constantly evolving. The evolution, however, maintains a connection to the past. The specific wording introduced by legislatures in mediating various social, economic and political influences can endure. Specific text can last for decades without change, replicated as genetic inheritance passed from one Act to another. Text can also evolve. Tracing the specific wording of clauses in legislation can reveal much about the importance of ideas at particular points in time. The focus on specific wording also leads to deeper questions about the motivations of policy actors and the mechanics of the policy process.

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1 Burton R. Clark, The problem of complexity in modern higher education (Graduate School of Education, University of California, LA, 1987).

2 Clark Kerr, The uses of the university (Harvard University Press, 2005), 8.

3 Burton Clark, The higher education system: Academic organization in cross-national perspective (University of California Press, 1983).

4 Ibid, 4.

5 David Watson, “The coming of post-institutional higher education,” Oxford Review of Education, 41, no. 5 (2015): 549–562.

6 University of Sydney Act 1850 (NSW).

7 Finance publications highlight government support of all kinds totalled $1 billion out of $2.5 in total revenue for the University of Sydney in 2018: Department of Education and Training, 2018 Higher Education Providers Finance Table (Department of Education and Training, 2018), document created 13 March 2020, https://docs.education.gov.au/node/53363.

8 University of Sydney Act 1989 (NSW), incorporating amendments to 1 December 2017.

9 Three acts were identified that support the provision of bursaries for school students who are transitioning to the University of Sydney, indirectly supporting the financing of the university: Public Instruction Act 1880 (NSW).; Bursary Endowment Act 1912 (NSW).; and Public Instruction and University (Amendment) Act 1936 (NSW).

10 Sydney University Act 1852 No 28a (NSW).; Sydney University Incorporation Act Amendment Act of 1861, No 10a (NSW).

11 Sydney University Act 1853 No 18a (NSW).; and Sydney University Act 1853 No 28a (NSW).

12 Sydney University Affiliated Colleges Act (1854) No 37a (NSW).; Saint Andrew’s College Incorporation Act 1867 (NSW).

13 Sydney University Graduates Act 1857 No 10a (NSW), s.1.

14 University Extension Act 1884 No 15a (NSW), s.3.

15 Women’s College University Endowment Act 1889 No 21a (NSW).

16 University and University Colleges Act 1900 No 22 (NSW).

17 Appropriation Act of 1874 No 7a (NSW), 59.

18 Appropriation Act of 1900-1901 (1900 No 59) (NSW), 436.

19 Appropriation Act of 1889 No 33a (NSW), 145.

20 University (Amendment) Act 1912 No 52 (NSW), s. 14.

21 University and University Colleges (Amendment) Act 1973 No 1 (NSW), s.3.(j).(i)

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22 University of Sydney Act 1989 No 124 (NSW).

23 Appropriation Act 1912 No 50 (NSW), 702.

24 University and University Colleges (Amendment) Act (1902) (NSW).

25 New South Wales, University and University Colleges (Amendment) Bill (1902) (NSW) Second Reading Speech, Legislative Assembly Hansard, 12 November 1902, 4453 (Mr Perry. Minister for Public Instruction).

26 Trow’s seminal work makes this point authoritatively:

“A rapid and potentially almost un-limited growth of higher education, at the per capita cost levels of the former small elite systems, places intolerable burdens on national and state budgets that are also having to cope with growing demands from other public agencies, such as social welfare, preschool education and child care, primary and secondary school systems, housing, transportation, and defense.”

Martin Trow, Problems in the transition from elite to mass higher education (Carnegie Commission on Higher Education 1973), 35.

27 New South Wales, University (Amendment) Bill 1912 No 52 (NSW) Second Reading Debate, Legislative Council Hansard, 30 October 1912, 2469 (The Hon. F. Flowers).

28 New South Wales, University (Amendment) Bill 1912 No 52 (NSW) Second Reading Debate, Legislative Council Hansard, 30 October 1912, 2474 (The Hon. Sir Normand MacLaurin).

29 University (Amendment) Act 1916 No 78 (NSW).

30 New South Wales, University (Amendment) Bill (1916) No 78 (NSW) First Reading, Legislative Assembly Hansard, 12 December 1916, 3572 (Mr James, Minister of Public Instruction).

31 Appropriation Act, Act No 72 1916 (NSW), 224.

32 Appropriation Act, Act No 54 1936 (NSW), 866, 878.

33 Appropriation Act 1937 (NSW).

34 New South Wales, University and University Colleges (Amendment) Bill 1937 No 30 (NSW) Second Reading, Legislative Assembly Hansard, 9 December 1937, 2512 (Mr Drummond. Minister for Education)

35 Appropriation Act 1947 No 35 (NSW), 242.

36 New South Wales, University and University Colleges (Amendment) Bill 1948 No 24 Second Reading, Legislative Assembly Hansard, 27 April 1948, 2941 (Mr Heffron, Minister for Education).

37 Tertiary Education Quality and Standards Agency, Guidance Note: Corporate Governance Version 2.4 (Tertiary Education Quality and Standards Agency , 2019), document created 26 August 2019, https://www.teqsa.gov.au/latest-news/publications/guidance-note-corporate-governance.

38 Simon Marginson and Mark Considine, The enterprise university: Power, governance and reinvention in Australia (Cambridge University Press, 2000), 7.

39 Alnoor Ebrahim, “Accountability in practice: Mechanisms for NGOs,” World Development, 31, no. 5 (2003): 813–829.

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40 Joseph C. Burke, “The many faces of accountability”, Achieving accountability in higher education: Balancing public, academic, and market demands, ed, Joseph Burke, (Jossey-Bass, San Francisco, CA, 2005), 2.

41 Women’s College (Amendment) Act 1927 No 55 (NSW).

42 University Amendment (Vice-Chancellor) Act 1924 No 35 (NSW).

43 Appropriation Acts spanning 1884 to 1904 made reference to additional endowments in all years, with the exception of 1892, 1899, 1901 and 1902.

44 An Act to apply a sum out of the Consolidated Revenue to the service of the year ending on the thirtieth day of June One thousand eight hundred and eighty-eight and to appropriate the Supplies granted in this Session of Parliament 1887 (Vic), 432.

45 An Act to apply a sum out of the Consolidated Revenue to the service of the year ending on the thirtieth day of June One thousand eight hundred and eighty-nine and to appropriate the Supplies granted in this Session of Parliament 1888 (Vic), 362.

46 An Act to apply a sum out of the Consolidated Revenue to the service of the year ending on the thirtieth day of June One thousand eight hundred and ninety-eight and to appropriate the Supplies granted in this Session of Parliament 1897 (Vic), 109.

47 The University Act 1904 (Vic), s. 3–5.

48 An Act to enable the Council of the University of Melbourne to confer Degrees in Surgery 1876 (Vic).

49 Access was extended to women by: The University Act 1881 (Vic).

50 In 1890 earlier Victorian Acts were consolidated, clarifying governance requirements, and enabling the University of Melbourne to offer awards (except in divinity) available in any other university in the British dominions, is analogous to content embedded within the University of Western Australia: University Act 1890 (Vic), s.25.; University of Western Australia Act 1911 (WA), s.29.

51 Agricultural Education Act 1919 (Vic).

52 The University Act 1904 (Vic), s. 4.(c).

53 Agricultural Education Act 1919 (Vic), s. 2. (d).

54 Ibid, s.2.(e).

55 University Act 1923 (Vic), s. 27. 1. (f).

56 Ibid, s. 26.

57 Ibid, 28. 1. (a).

58 Ibid, 28. 1. (b).

59 Ibid, s. 29.

60 Victoria, University Bill 1923 (Vic) Second Reading, Legislative Assembly Hansard, 16 October 1923, 1396-1401 (Hon. H. Cohen (Honorary Minister).

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61 Richard Joseph Wheeler Selleck, The Shop: The University of Melbourne, 1850-1939 (Melbourne Univ. Publishing, 2003), 432.

62 The Tasmanian Council of Education and Scholarship Act (22 Vic, No 21) 1858 (Tas).; The Tasmanian Council of Education and Scholarship Act No 2 (35 Vic, No 16) 1871 (Tas).; The Tasmanian Council of Education and Scholarship Act, No 3 (42 Vic, No 30) 1879 (Tas).; An Act To Appropriate A Sum Of 800 Pounds To Mr Charles Seymour Dowdell In Lieu Of A Tasmanian Scholarship (46 Vic, No 49) 1882 (Tas).; The Tasmanian Council of Education and Scholarship Act (51 Vic, No 22) 1887 (Tas).; An Act Supplementary To The Acts For Appropriating Certain Sums Arising From The Consolidated Revenue Fund To The Service Of The Colony Of Tasmania For The Years 1885 And 1886, And For The Half-Year Ending 30Th June, 1887 (51 Vic, No 15) 1887 (Tas), 526.

63 Appropriation Acts from 1887 to 1950, excluding 1892, 1899, 1936, 1937, 1939, 1940, 1941, 1943, 1945 and 1948.

64 University (Amendment) Act 1912 No 52 (NSW).

65 The Appropriation Act 1913–14 (4 Geo V, No 19) 1913 (Tas), 527.

66 In 1935 the university’s endowment increase from £4,000 to £10,000: The Tasmanian University Act 1935 (26 Geo V, No 34) 1935 (Tas), s.VI.(f).

67 Appropriation Act 1935–36 (26 Geo V, No 49) 1935 (Tas), 1217.

68 The Appropriation Act 1916–17 (7 Geo V, No 32) 1916 (Tas), 232.

69 The Appropriation Act 1917–18 (8 Geo V, No 44) 1917 (Tas), 768.

70 Ibid.

71 The Appropriation Act 1919–20 (10 Geo V, No 23) 1919 (Tas), 820.

72 The Appropriation Act 1920–21 (11 Geo V, No 13) 1920 (Tas), 70.

73 The word ‘four’ is deleted and replaced with ‘ten’ (thousand pounds): Tasmanian University Act 1935 (Tas), s. VI.(f).

74 Infrastructure Australia, Project Evaluation Summary. Northern Transformation Program, (Infrastructure Australia, 2019), retrieved 1 October 2020, https://www.infrastructureaustralia.gov.au/sites/default/files/2019-07/utas_project_evaluation_summary.pdf.

75 Department of Education and Training, “Delegate Approval of Determination No 4803, 41 Other Grants, Jobs & Growth in Tasmania Education-Driven Economic Revitalisation of Launceston & Burnie Campuses”, HEIMS Online Institution Payment Information. (Department of Education and Training, 2019), retrieved 27 July 2020, https://app.heims.education.gov.au/HeimsOnline/IPInfo/Determination.

76 Tasmanian University Act 1935 (Tas) s. 3.

77 Don Anderson, “Access to university education in Australia 1852–1990: Changes in the undergraduate social mix,” Higher Education Review, 24, no. 2 (1992): 8.

78 Belinda Probert, The era of universal participation in higher education: Australian policy problems in relation to cost, equity and quality (Occasional paper for Higher Education Research and Development Society of Australasia (HERDSA) 2016).

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79 Higher Education Funding Act 1988 No 2, 1989 (Cth), s. 5.

80 Higher Education Funding Amendment Act (No 2) 1992 No 158 of 1992 (Cth), s. 5.

81 There are limited references to the Higher Education Funding Bill in definitive publications exploring the Dawkins reforms: Stuart Macintyre, Andre Brett, and Gwilym Croucher, No end of a lesson: Australia’s unified national system of higher education (Melbourne University Publishing 2017); Gwilym Croucher et al., eds, The Dawkins revolution 25 years on. (Melbourne University Publishing, 2013).

82 State Grants (Universities) Act 1951 (Cth).

83 Ibid, s. 5.(2).(b).

84 States Grants (Universities) Act 1953 (Cth).

85 Committee on Australian Universities, Report of the committee on Australian universities [Murray report] (Commonwealth of Australia, Committee on Australian Universities, Government Printer, Canberra, 1957).

86 States Grants (Universities) Act 1958 (Cth).

87 Ibid, Third Schedule.

88 States Grants (Universities) Act 1960 (Cth), Third Schedule.

89 States Grants (Universities) Act 1962 (Cth), Fifth Schedule.

90 Australian Universities Commission Act 1959 (Cth), s. 13.(1).(a).

91 Universities (Financial Assistance) Acts 1963, 1964, 1965a, 1965b, 1966a, 1966b, 1967a, 1967b, 1969a, 1969b (Cth).

92 Universities (Financial Assistance) Act 1963 (No 68, 1963) (Cth), Third Schedule.

93 Ibid, s. 9.

94 States Grants (Universities) Act 1951 (Cth).

95 States Grants (Universities) Act 1958 (Cth).

96 Universities Assistance Act 1963 (Cth).

97 Universities Assistance Act 1966a (Cth).

98 States Grants (Universities) Act 1973 (No 97, 1973) (Cth).; States Grants (Universities) Act (No 2) 1973 (No 60, 1973) (Cth).; States Grants (Universities) Act (No 3) 1973 (No 176, 1973) (Cth).

99 States Grants (Advanced Education) 1965 (Cth).

100 States Grants (Advanced Education) Act 1974 (Cth).

101 States Grants (Tertiary Education Assistance) Act 1977 (Cth).

102 States Grants (Tertiary Education Assistance) Act 1984 (Cth) Compilation C2004C07042.

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103 States Grants (Universities) Act 1951 (Cth) s. 3.

104 States Grants (Tertiary Education Assistance) Act 1984 (Cth) s. 3.

105 There are various accounts of the broad trajectory of Australian higher education policy, including: Simon Marginson, “Nation-building universities in a global environment: The case of Australia,” Higher Education, 43, no.3 (2002): 409–428.; Trevor Gale and Deb Tranter, “Social justice in Australian higher education policy: An historical and conceptual account of student participation,” Critical Studies in Education, 52, no. 1(2011), 29–46.; Bruce Williams, “Australian universities 1939–1999: How different now?” Higher Education Quarterly, 54, no.2 (2000): 147–165.: Other texts have examined the Committee in more detail: Susan. L. Davies, The Martin Committee and the binary policy of higher education in Australia (Ashwood House 1989).

106 States Grants (Tertiary Education Assistance) Act 1984 (Cth).

107 Commonwealth Tertiary Education Commission, Review of efficiency and effectiveness in higher education (Commonwealth Tertiary Education Commission, 1986).

108 Ibid, 17.

109 Ibid, 18.

110 John. S. Dawkins, The challenge for higher education in Australia (Department of Education and Training, Canberra, Australian Government Publishing Service, 1987).

111 John. S. Dawkins, Higher education: a policy statement (Department of Employment, Education and Training, Australian Government Publishing Service, 1988).

112 National Archives Australia, Cabinet Submission 5890 – Higher education policy statement – Decisions 11354/SA and 11487 (National Archives Australia 1988).; National Archives Australia, (1988b) Cabinet Submission 5922 – Establishing a Higher Education Contribution Scheme – Decisions 11532/ER, 11533/ER, 11552/ER, 11582/ER, 11730, 11731 and 11733 (National Archives Australia 1988).

113 Commonwealth Tertiary Education Commission, Review of efficiency and effectiveness in higher education, 257.

114 Dawkins, The challenge for higher education in Australia, 1.

115 National Archives Australia, Cabinet Submission 5890 – Higher education policy statement – Decisions 11354/SA and 11487, 11.

116 Commonwealth, Higher Education Funding Bill 1988 (Cth) Second Reading, House of Representatives Hansard, 3 November 1988, 2401 (John Dawkins, Minister for Education).

117 Ibid, 2404.

118 Acts Interpretation Act 1901 (Cth); Remuneration Tribunals Act 1973 (Cth); Commonwealth Tertiary Education Commission Act 1977 (Cth).

119 Higher Education Funding Act 1988 (Cth), s. 15, s. 16, s. 24, s. 25, s. 101, s. 104.

120 Higher Education Funding Act 1988 (Cth), s. 3.

121 Deakin University, for example, augments teaching and research objects with those of realising Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander aspirations and safeguarding their cultural heritage: Deakin University Act 2009 (Vic), s. 5.(f).

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122 Julia Horne, “Political Machinations and Sectarian Intrigue in the Making of Sydney University.” Journal of the Australian Catholic Historical Society, no. 36 (January 2015): 4–15.

123 University of Sydney Act 1989 (NSW), s. 6.(1).

124 Ibid, s. 31.

125 Peter Coaldrake, What’s in a name? Review of the higher education provider category standards – Final report (Department of Education, 2010).

126 University of Queensland Act 1909 (Qld).

127 University Act 1909 (Vic).

128 States Grants (Universities) Act 1951 (Cth), s. 3.

129 States Grants (Universities) Act 1960 (Cth), s. 4.

130 States Grants (Tertiary Education Assistance) Act 1977 No 158 (Cth), s. 5.(1).; States Grants (Tertiary Education Assistance) Act 1984 No 127 (Cth), s. 3.

131 Higher Education Funding Act 1988 (Cth), s. 3.

132 Higher Education Funding Amendment Act (No 2) 1992, No 158 (Cth).

133 Commonwealth, Higher Education Funding Amendment Bill (No 2) (Cth) Second Reading, House of Representatives Hansard, 4 November 1992, 2625 (P. J. Baldwin).

“To complement these arrangements and to assist in the accountability process, the Bill includes a statement of the Commonwealth’s objectives in higher education.”

134 Commonwealth, Higher Education Funding Amendment Bill (No 2) 1992 (Cth) Debate, Senate Official Hansard No 156, 2 December 1992, 4018 (Senator Teague).

“I also note the insertion by clause 61 of some ‘objects’ for the higher education system. This will provide a measure by which we can judge the Government’s policies. So far it would appear that, even by the measures now set out in statutory form, the Government has failed. However, we support the inclusion of such worthy objects in this statutory form.”

135 Higher Education Funding Amendment Act (No 2) 1992, (No 158, 1992) (Cth), s. 61.

136 Commonwealth of Australia, Higher Education Support Bill 2003 (Cth): Explanatory Memorandum (Commonwealth of Australia, 2003), 6.

137 Higher Education Support Bill 2003 (Cth), s. 2–1.

138 Commonwealth, Higher Education Support Bill 2003, Higher Education Support (Transitional Provisions and Consequential Amendments) Bill 2003 (Cth) Moved Amendment, Senate Journal No 117, 25 November 2003, 2701 (Senator Kim Carr).

“the Senate deplores the fact that important features of the nation’s higher education system are being fundamentally reshaped and redefined by the Higher Education Support Bill 2003 and that such a radical assault of the fundamentals of the system was neither foreshadowed nor discussed during the review process.”

138

139 Commonwealth, Higher Education Support Bill 2003 (Cth) Debates, House of Representatives. Official Hansard No 16, 14 October 2003, 21362 (L. Tanner).

“half of all places go to people who are paying full fees—in effect, advantaging those who have the resources to pay those fees up front and therefore ensuring that we will see degrees costing in the vicinity of $100,000 plus; and allow people to jump the merit queue.”

140 Higher Education Support Amendment (Extending Fee-Help for Vet Diploma, Advanced Diploma, Graduate Diploma and Graduate Certificate Courses) Act 2007 (No 170, 2007) (Cth).

141 Higher Education Support Amendment (Demand Driven Funding System and Other Measures) Act 2011 (No 104, 2011) (Cth).

142 Department of Education, “Independent Review of Adoption of the Model Code on Freedom of Speech and Academic Freedom,” Department of Education, 2019, retrieved 1 October 2020, https://www.education.gov.au/independent-review-freedom-speech-australian-higher-education-providers

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CHAPTER SEVEN: ADAPTIVE PRESSURES MEDIATING HEREDITY

No single causal explanation for the growth and ubiquity of HPS [Higher Participation Systems] is convincing. Some factors are stronger than others. Governments are often instrumental in growth but also work in conjunction with other drivers. Though the expansion of higher education is simultaneous with the advance of vocational skills and their use, it is likely that causation runs in both directions. The tendency of aggregated economic demand is fragmented, variable, and appears insufficient to explain the ubiquity and dynamism of HPS growth. Explanations based in social demand for opportunity and position look stronger, if only because middle class family aspirations are similar across the modern world. Trow (1974) on California is the earliest but the most potent explanation.

Simon Marginson (2016). High participation systems of higher education.1

Australia has what Marginson describes as a higher participation system of higher education.2 Over half of all recent school leavers are engaged in tertiary education, four-fifths of whom are enrolled in higher education.3 It has been quite the progression from 1850 where no university existed in Australia, and 1857 when all students of the University of Sydney could feature in a single photograph.4 The dominant feature of any coherent analysis of Australian higher education is that it has grown and expanded considerably. Australia is not alone in this regard. The United States of America may have been the first to achieve a high-participation system, but now it is in the company of dozens of countries.5

The factors influencing higher levels of participation across the globe defy singular causal explanation, as Marginson describes with commanding authority. There is no reason to reproduce Marginson’s rich empirical analysis. Higher education is a globally interconnected system of discrete national- and state-based systems. Each comprised of individual institutions that provide a home for scholars of different disciplinary persuasions. Reducing this complexity into a unified causal explanation can only be achieved with high and useless levels of abstraction. A valid yet less than useful explanation would be that higher education has expanded to high levels of participation in many countries because it delivers benefits of various forms that are valued by these societies. The legislative basis for heredity explored in this dissertation provides a means by which factors influencing Australia’s transition from elite to mass and near-universal levels of participation can be assessed.

Transitioning from useless high-level assertion to evidence-based insight informed by heredity requires a means of sifting through near-infinite datapoints. A theoretically informed and incisive segmentation is necessary but should strive to avoid Burton Clark’s pitfall of theory-defined hypothesis disconnected from the reality of decision-making quoted at the beginning of Chapter Four.6 This chapter occupies the Goldilocks zone of a theoretically informed and evidence-based assessment of the environmental factors mediating heredity, whilst avoiding an excessive theoretically defined abstraction of heredity. Not too theoretical, but theoretical enough, whilst drawing upon valid evidence of legislative detail and policy cycle artefacts. Preceding chapters have been deliberately descriptive, exploring the influence of jurisdictions in the making of financing legislation and the long-term trend towards complexity. The results are not surprising in that legislatures that share a Westminster tradition and overlapping

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history will make financing legislation that is broadly consistent but nuanced for its specific context. In the making of this legislation there is a trend towards complexity, albeit with intermittent consolidation. This process of proliferation of funded activities and consolidation is more surprising given it is repeated across different jurisdictions, different forms of financing legislation, and on different time horizons. This is not a product of social forces operating at any single place and time. It appears to be a structural property of Australian higher education policy.

Preceding chapters, despite twin achievements (or pathologies) of laborious detail stretching across grand timescales, fail to provide a plausible explanation for why Australian higher education has created so much financing legislation, and why over recent decades it is amended at an internationally significant rate. This chapter will explore the environmental factors visible within legislation and at critical stages of the policy cycle. Subsequent analysis is segmented by theorisation of higher education and public policy, consistent with the structure of Chapter Three, and which forms the basis for the heredity model. Adaptive pressure is considered from the higher education trinity of disciplinary, institutional and social perspectives. Adaptive pressure is considered from the public policy perspective of stability and change, including notions of path dependency, bounded rationality, punctuated equilibrium, and multiple streams. Together, these higher education and public policy perspectives help explain why Australia’s financing legislation has taken the evolutionary trajectory documented in preceding chapters, shaping how legislation is made and implemented.

These factors are not a comprehensive assessment of the full range of social forces that shape higher education, nor that which higher education influences. As described on page 17 of the introductory chapter, historians, sociologists and public policy scholars each have their own methods and literature that makes sense of influences shaping Australian higher education. The approach taken in this chapter is distinct from other literature and disciplinary approaches because it maintains a focus on higher education financing legislation. This approach allows one to identify environmental factors that are encoded within the genotype of financing legislation, and those cited by key components of the parliamentary machinery that generates this legislation. The key stage of the policy cycle examined is the second reading speech. The second reading of legislation describes the principle of the legislative proposal.7 The second reading provides insight into the espoused rationale of government in presenting the Bill for parliamentary approval. This may not align perfectly with the full range of motivations, but the second reading and related debate is an expedient shorthand for isolating the causal influences in the passage of Australian higher education financing legislation.

HIGHER EDUCATION PERSPECTIVES ON ADAPTIVE PRESSURE

There is a tradition in higher education scholarship that considers higher education across long time series. Metaphor abounds to describe the complexity of history in succinct terms. Watson describes university history as geology: “strata are laid down at different times, in different ways, and for different purposes”.8 Kerr weaves the many strands of history into his description of the multiversity, highlighting that many of the features of the university we take for granted today were spun from medieval yarn.9 Barnett describes the purposes of the university, originally in service of God, morphing to the pursuit of knowledge through research, then the entrepreneurial institution pejoratively driven by self-interest. Barnett goes on to explore plausible utopias that include the idea of the ecological institution concerned with

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serving others, rather than God, the disciplines or itself.10 Barnett’s framing supports an analytic sequencing of adaptive pressures from inside to outside the university.

Expanding Frontiers and Segmentation of Knowledge

The University of Sydney was established because it was seen as “expedient for the better advancement of morality and religion”. Australia’s first university fits neatly within Barnett’s historic pattern of development as an institute “for God”. It is difficult to be further “inside” the university than one’s inner religious beliefs. The University of Sydney may have embedded in legislation espoused motivation to please God, but was, from its point of genesis, an institution that represented a contemporary manifestation of the frontiers and segmentation of knowledge. The university had legislative powers to confer degrees in arts, law, medicine, midwifery and pharmacy, although did not offer degrees in all these areas at point of establishment. Knowledge of the world was imperfect at that time. Knowledge of the world today remains imperfect, but the frontiers and categories of knowledge have expanded dramatically.

The expansion in categories of knowledge is evident in the most recent iteration of the Australian and New Zealand Standard Research Classification. There are now 23 subdivisions of research, split into 213 groups and 1,967 classes.11 The first formal standard classification of research in 1993 was made up of 12 subdivisions, 86 groups and 486 classes.12 It is not unreasonable to assess whether the expansion and segmentation of knowledge has exerted adaptive pressure that is also embedded within Australian higher education legislation.

There is evidence of disciplinary adaptive pressure across the foundational era of higher education. In New South Wales, financing legislation makes provision to support disciplinary activity spanning a half century. The 1878 Appropriation Act made provision for “Scientific Apparatus and Geological Specimens”.13 The 1928 Appropriation Act made provision for Chairs of agriculture, veterinary science, botany, economics, midwifery, mechanical engineering, anthropology and architecture.14 Between these dates, provision was also made for disciplines that included modern literature,15 medicine, anatomy,16 astronomy, and organic and applied chemistry.17 A similar pattern was evident in Victoria, with late 19th and early 20th century funding directed towards a widening array of disciplines and disciplinary activity. Provision for biological, chemical, and mechanical laboratories was made in 1889,18 bacteriology in 1900,19 mining, education, engineering and agriculture in 1910.20 This suggests that state legislatures played a significant role in the integration of fields of knowledge within the university through their legislative powers.

The onset of the Commonwealth’s role in higher education financing in 1951 allocated funds on the basis of the state’s contribution to universities, Commonwealth scholarships, and research grants for physical, social and biological sciences.21 This general reference to disciplinary funding becomes more sophisticated across time in line with the growing complexity of States Grants Acts over subsequent decades. Multiple States Grants Acts passed in 1973, for example, included reference to grants that supported a wide range of disciplines. Provision for social work, agriculture, dentistry and psychiatry was made in one 1973 iteration.22 A more fulsome 1973 iteration includes provision for management education, teaching and research in medicine and veterinary science, and a long list of building projects targeting almost every science and humanities discipline imaginable at the time.23 Not every reference to a discipline is representative of an expansion or segmentation of the frontiers of

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knowledge. Medicine and veterinary science, for example, existed long before any specific appropriations were made in 1973. What the 1973 States Grants Acts demonstrate, however, is that Commonwealth financing legislation makes specific provision for disciplinary interests, much of which might be considered traditional disciplines, whilst supporting emerging disciplines such as social work, and strengthening other disciplines through establishing a National School of Management. The Commonwealth appears to have played a significant role in the integration of disciplines within the university through its financing and legislative power, at least through part of its legislative history.

The introduction of the Higher Education Funding Act (1988) led to a consolidation of a long list of detailed funding schedules that included overt reference to disciplinary-focused expenditure. In its place emerged more general categories of grant for which the only disciplinary-centric reference was grants for teaching hospitals.24 By 2002, HEFA was on the verge of being displaced by HESA as the primary financing instrument for higher education. HEFA in 2002 retains grant categories for teaching hospitals, and between 1988 and 2002 augments discipline-related grant categories for engineering and multimedia.25 This an accumulation of disciplinary references within financing legislation, but this is comparatively weaker than the range of disciplinary references within legislation throughout the foundational era.

There were several mechanisms established within HEFA that allowed the Commonwealth to support teaching and research in ever more specialised and numerous disciplines. HEFA grants for special research assistance,26 for example, potentially allocated funds consistent with the expansion and segmentation of expansion, but patterns of financing in policy instruments other than the principle Act are beyond the scope of this research.

HEFA offers evidence of progressively weaker adaptive pressure arising from an expanding frontier and segmentation of knowledge. Amendments to HEFA are not one of incremental absorption of disciplinary activities. The accumulation of text within HEFA arises from the refinement and elaboration of the higher education loan program, more than doubling the Act from 92 pages in 1988 to 209 pages in 2002. Whilst various loan program amendments may intersect with disciplinary considerations, HEFA was silent on their disciplinary detail. The introduction of student contribution bands in 1996, for example, introduced differential student contributions on the basis of discipline of study. The disciplinary detail of this was gazetted annually by government, with HEFA utilising the less-than-transparent text of Band 3, Band 2 and Band 1.27 There are disciplinary features to the funding changes, but they are not explicitly encoded within financing legislation.

The introduction of HESA represents a further consolidation of grants categories to three: Commonwealth Grants Scheme, Other Grants and Grants for Commonwealth Scholarships. There are no specific disciplinary references within HESA grant categories. Like HEFA, HESA elaborates and refines the basis of the higher education loan program, introducing funding clusters with a clearer disciplinary basis.28 These funding clusters remain unchanged, although the government has signalled an intent for their consolidation in the 2020 Job-ready graduates discussion paper.29 From 2003 to 2020, and 70 amendments, there is little within HESA today that suggests its evolution has been a result of disciplinary-based adaptive pressure.

HESA’s accumulation of text from 216 pages in 2003 to 540 pages in 2020 is primarily the result of refinement and elaboration of the administrative rules associated with the core

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financing instrument of the higher education loan program. The proliferation of loan programs across time explains much of the accumulation of text. HECS-HELP, FEE-HELP, OS-HELP, SA-HELP, VET FEE-HELP and VSL are variations of the basic income-contingent loan scheme first introduced with the Dawkins reforms. Text relating to VET FEE-HELP specifically (not higher education related but enabled through HESA) makes up over 100 pages of HESA. Each variant represents a means by which the Commonwealth can expand access to higher (and tertiary) education whilst not fully financing its cost. The loan programs have, from the outset, been a means of shifting costs of participation to students.

Across state and Commonwealth financing legislation under consideration, it is evident that disciplinary references, as a proxy for the growth and specialisation of knowledge, have exerted some adaptive pressure. The expansion and segmentation of knowledge is represented in university Acts and States Grants Acts from 1850 to 1988. This is consistent with other reference points, including international references to disciplines in university handbooks, courses and research centres.30 The government’s role in supporting disciplines through core financing legislation appears to have weakened across time. Research funding allocations towards specific disciplines is now embedded in sophisticated grant allocation mechanisms, such as the Australian Research Council. Teaching funding allocations for specific disciplines is now embedded in guidelines and gazetted funding clusters rather than within financing legislation. From 2009 to 2020 there has been no change to the fields of education encoded within the funding clusters.31 Funding allocated towards each discipline will have varied across time as Commonwealth preferences for market-centric, demand-driven funding or state-centric central allocation mechanisms have ebbed and flowed across time, but neither approach has translated into significant changes to disciplinary references within financing legislation over the last three decades.

Burton Clark’s exploration of the differentiation of disciplines suggests that the underlying trend towards complexity in higher education is based on three core drivers:32 the diversification of students as higher education becomes more accessible; the widening of the labour market as economies become more sophisticated; and the result of research within the academy. One might expect that in a context demonstrating greater student participation, a more complex economy, and differentiation of the academy, financing legislation would mirror or parallel a more differentiated higher education system. However, this is not the case. Disciplinary influences within financing legislation are more prominent at an earlier phase of the system’s development. We must consider other explanations behind Australia’s distinctive approach to higher education financing legislation that are exerting adaptive pressure on its heredity.

Serving the University, Or the University Serving Society?

The purposes of institutions, and purposes of legislation that direct funding to institutions, have been explored in some detail in preceding chapters and demonstrate an explicit service to society. Legislative references to the purposes, or “uses of the university” were described in Chapter Five (“sound learning” and “useful knowledge”). Legislative references to the purposes of higher education system financing were described in Chapter Six (“a more [or less] highly educated population”). The introduction of text describing the distinctive purposes of universities within HESA in 2003 might be perceived as a manifestation of university self-interest. However, analysis of Hansard as amendments are inserted into the HESA Bill during Senate debate provide no insights into the origins nor underlying rationale for the inclusion of

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this text. The distinctive purposes of universities inserted by the amendment are an unambiguous statement of the role that universities play in society, rather than insular and unabashed self-interest.

References within the literature that point towards the rise of a more internal and self-serving orientation are not clearly visible in earlier analysis of the objectives of financing legislation. The enterprise university,33 the entrepreneurial university,34 and, as Barnett suggests, the university for itself is not analogous to “sound learning” or a “more highly educated population”. It is worth questioning in this context whether key features of the entrepreneurial university are evident within financing legislation. Institutional self-interest might be evident as adaptive pressure driving change in financing legislation, or it might arise more actively if financing legislation fails to adequately address institutional aspirations and objectives.

Universities have been described as possessing a structural adaptive capacity for adding and subtracting fields of knowledge without disturbing all the others, whilst maintaining a coherent appearance of similarity to other universities.35 This capacity is supported by an ongoing mediation of the specific needs and interests of university community members, which are often in conflict as a form of “inter-personal and inter-group warfare”.36 The test of this mediation is whether innovations of the right type take precedence over the “conservatism of the institution”.37 This conservatism provides reason to “stay in the traditional box” and avoid “self-induced major change”.38

Universities have demonstrably transformed themselves, leading Burton Clark to undertake case study analysis of institutions across multiple higher education systems. The resulting publication of Creating entrepreneurial universities: Organizational pathways of transformation39 put the notion of entrepreneurial university on the map, leading to the normalisation of this phrasing from the mid 1990s.40 Key identifiers of the entrepreneurial university described by Clark included a diversified funding base comprised of government funding beyond the core financing mechanism, private income and university income through patents and contracts. The factors resulting in a diversified funding base were then explored in some detail within university case studies.

Defining entrepreneurialism by an internally mediated transformation and diversified funding base might suggest that evidence of entrepreneurialism is best found within specific institutions rather than national financing legislation. There is evidence, however, of financing legislation adopting the language of transformation at around the time at which the entrepreneurial university terminology becomes prominent in discourse. Amendments to HEFA in 1997 introduce the notion of “Grants for restructuring and rationalisation programs”.41 Restructuring is not interchangeable with transformation but is the first explicit category of grant made available within HEFA that sought to support institutional change. That this change is motivated by seeking cost efficiencies through restructures and rationalisation is not inconsistent with entrepreneurial discourse. It provides evidence of the government seeking to influence internal structures and organisation at a time of overt public funding constraint. These conditions might then incentivise an entrepreneurial, diversified revenue base.

The replacement of HEFA by HESA retained a broad category of grant consistent with the government’s intention of transforming the university, although reworded to “Grants to foster collaboration and reform in higher education”.42 This category of grant was activated in 2005

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with funded projects including those consistent with revenue diversification through engagement with business.43 Not content with the pursuit of “collaboration and reform”, subsequent amendments to HESA introduced new variations of this category of grant. 2007 brought in “Grants to support diversity and structural reform”44 and 2009 “Grants to support structural adjustment”.45

The similarity in nomenclature for the grant categories might imply similar intent, but they arise at different points in time, in different political contexts and with different espoused aims. These aims are evident in second reading speeches associated with their introduction. HEFA’s 1997 “restructuring” grant was motivated by the pursuit of efficiency.46 HESA’s 2007 diversity grants valued institutional specialisation over one-size-fits-all homogeneity.47 HESA’s 2009 “structural adjustment” grants pursued the objective of supporting universities diverse missions.48 These grants provide evidence of the Commonwealth seeking to reshape higher education through targeted grants, rather than responding to university demands to cultivate entrepreneurial transformation.

The legislation and second reading speeches provide a window into the policy process, but do not reveal the full picture. It is possible that the grants (or other features of legislation) arise from university advocacy within the broader policy process to achieve particular policy and financing outcomes. This might explain the insertion of the distinctive purposes of the university within the purposes of HESA in 2003. Institutional submissions to policy consultation processes at various points in the sector’s history may reveal varying degrees of self-absorption. The establishment and history of the Australian Vice-Chancellors’ Committee (AVCC) is indeed one of sustained policy advocacy.49 The AVCC has morphed into Universities Australia, and on some of the bigger policy debates over the last decade, university self-interest has not been well-realised. Near-universal university support for fee liberalisation in 2014 higher education reforms was not supported by parliament.50 Near-universal university support for maintaining demand-driven funding as a means of achieving “innovation, fairness and excellence”51 resulted in the introduction of the Maximum Basic Grant Amount and hard caps on the Commonwealth’s university funding.52 Universities may serve society, and act in their self-interest when doing so, but the legislation gives little credence to a potential explanation that financing legislation is created and amended at a high rate as a result of university self-interest.

Social and Economic Demand for Higher Education

Legislatures must mediate many social, economic and political forces in the passage of legislation. Relevant to widening participation in higher education, political values will inform whether a greater or lesser proportion of members of parliament favour a “more” highly educated population, or a “highly enough” educated population, or lower level of participation at any particular point in time. The proportions of such members are regularly recalibrated via elections. Whilst Hansard is peppered with comments that parliaments should be circumspect about funding too many students attending university, there is an indisputable trend towards higher rates of participation. This implies sustained adaptive pressure exerted by social demand for higher education that has been accommodated by legislatures at various points. This is ostensibly the thesis of Martin Trow in the Transition from elite to mass participation.53 Higher education’s expansion creates feedback loops of demand, the culmination of which normalises higher levels of participation:

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And when the proportion of the whole population comes to be about 50 percent … failure to go on to higher education from secondary school is increasingly a mark of some defect of mind or character that has to be explained or justified or apologized for.54

The laws of supply and demand suggest that the comparatively high rates of students now attending university genuinely want to be there. Peer or parental pressure may be part of the equation that drives student participation, but no one is forced to learn. Watson suggests that there is an “escape clause” for higher education in that “no one can make you take away what you don’t want to”.55 Additional supply has been created to satisfy increasing demand, opening questions about the legislative drivers that might catalyse both supply and demand. Multiple points in the legislative history of Australian higher education suggest that “economic demand” is the primary espoused rationale for legislation that enables system expansion, not a groundswell of social demand that must be accommodated; this economic rationale is moderated by social considerations.

The full introduction of demand-driven funding in 2012, for example, was predicated not on general social demand, but on projected labour market demand for persons with higher education qualifications.56 Satisfying this demand would require an increase in the supply of qualified applicants, including those from underrepresented groups.57 The relative importance and priority of these policy reforms was encapsulated in the 40/20 targets, broad labour market priorities first, tempered with a social equity lens:

• “40 per cent of 25 to 34 year olds with a degree by 2025 • 20 per cent of higher education enrolments from people of low socio-economic status

(SES) backgrounds by 2020.”58

Before Bradley, there was Nelson and the introduction of HESA. The second reading speech for HESA includes repeated references to economic and social development.59 The pre-cursor for HESA, Our universities: Backing Australia’s future again utilised these terms, but again privileged the economic in the ordering of the terminology.60 Before Nelson, there was Dawkins, who was criticised for taking too narrow an economic view in related policy consultation.61 Like Bradley and Nelson, Dawkins articulated the dual logic of economic demands, tempered by social considerations:

The society we want cannot be achieved without a strong economic base … The larger and more diverse is the pool from which we draw our skilled workforce, the greater is our capacity to take advantage of opportunities as they emerge. The current barriers to the participation of financially and other disadvantaged groups limit our capacity to develop the highest skilled workforce possible and are a source of economic inefficiency.62

One can step back though time and to less complex legislation and again see a similar pattern. The Martin report into the future of tertiary education in 1967 concluded with similar ordering that:

1.(v) The Committee believes that economic growth in Australia is dependent upon a high and advancing level of education …

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1.(x) The climate of opinion favours further expansion, and the Committee supports such expansion on both social and economic grounds.63

Before the Martin report, however, the economic imperative is not as explicit. The Murray report on the Committee on Australian Universities is less definitive about economic demand and is more clearly rooted in an elite model of higher education. Increasing demand is acknowledged as a problem, occurring in a context of “phenomenal growth of Australian industry”.64 Economic demand is implied, but not as clearly as in policy reviews and the introduction of legislation at subsequent points in the expansion of the system. Stepping back to the Commonwealth’s first coherent foray into higher education and the States Grants (Universities) Act of 1951, Prime Minister Menzies’ second reading speech makes no mention of the economy, labour or skills. The national interest is cited and may have had an understood subtext of economic growth and development, but the specific term “economic” and variants are not mentioned. A summary of advice provided by the expert panel into university financing that forms the basis of the first States Grants (Universities) Act similarly avoids any mention of the economy or related terminology.65

The Commonwealth’s embrace of economic development language within financing legislation has matured across time from marginal to central. By contrast, economic-related terminology was evident in the states well before the Commonwealth’s involvement in higher education. Victoria’s agricultural education legislation sought to leverage the economic benefits of a more professional approach to the agricultural economy.66 Provisions for economically productive investment can be observed beyond the big two states, including Tasmania.67 Any claims to state financing legislation being a beacon for a commitment to social and economic development must be tempered by the low level of student enrolment pre-war, and the prominence of discourse that is hostile to the idea of the university.

As South Australia debated an increase to the University of Adelaide’s maximum grant in 1923,68 one member suggested that too much medical education is undesirable given the state’s agrarian economy. One could speculate as to whether those hostile to an expansion of higher education in 1920s Adelaide would be proud or dismayed by what has been accomplished in South Australia in the century that follows.

There are about 1,100 young men attending the medical schools in Sydney and Melbourne. That is largely due to the ease with which scholarships can be won, and through the doors of the Universities being thrown open too widely. We do not want to encourage too much of that in this State. South Australia is an agricultural State, and whatever we have to spare, without starving the professions, should go to assist either technical or agricultural education.69

The Commonwealth’s progressive involvement in financing of higher education and support of ever-increasing participation is late to the party in recognising economic drivers for expansion. When this connection is clearly made in the 1960s, future expansion is predicated on economic demand, augmented with an acknowledgement of its social dimensions. Citing economic demand and actual economic demand for skilled labour are not one and the same. Trow uses the term “presumed” in relation to economic need and contributions to economic growth.70 As Australia enters its first recession in 30 years, and probable first depression in 90 years, the voices calling for greater investment in higher education today are those that also called for greater investment to satisfy economic demand for labour during the boom times.

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Economic demand for labour has collapsed but calls to boost higher education supply are louder than ever. Advocacy to expand higher education on social and economic grounds provides stronger evidence for adaptive pressure on financing legislation than institutional or disciplinary considerations. Attention is next turned to the extent to which the broader global context exerts adaptive pressure on the system’s heredity.

Financing Legislation in a Global Context

The University of Sydney included reference to foreign medical schools. This positioning of the university in a global context was not a prominent feature in the subsequent establishment of universities. The University of Melbourne Act was amended in 1890 to allow it to offer any degree available at universities in the British dominions. The University of Western Australia Act adopted a similar but narrower approach by awarding degrees that were offered in universities of the United Kingdom. The first century of Australian higher education may have fallen into line with global knowledge trends and how this knowledge was organised along disciplinary lines,71 but there was little reference to the global content in financing legislation. The onset of Commonwealth funding was equally bereft of references to the global higher education context.

States Grants Acts make little reference to international developments in higher education. 1951 coincided with the onset of The Colombo Plan and provision of scholarships for students across Asia to study at Australian universities.72 There is no mention of The Colombo Plan scholarships identified within Australian higher education financing legislation, nor any legislation for that matter. There are limitations in the research design that see important developments in higher education (like The Colombo Plan), out of the scope for analysis if it is not explicitly mentioned in higher education legislation.

If an important feature of Australian higher education, and global higher education, has been widening of access to support for higher levels of participation, an equally important feature is the large number of overseas students Australia now educates. The Colombo Plan is an important feature of the system’s shift towards educating those from overseas, but this is not immediately evident with legislation. The Colombo Plan is eventually integrated within legislation, although not for some years after its establishment, with funding for residential colleges, “international houses” in New South Wales (196773), Victoria (197674) and Western Australia (197775). In Victoria’s case, this Commonwealth funding is some 20 years after International House was founded in 1957.76

The shift from The Colombo Plan scholarships to the international behemoth that Australian higher education is today begins in 1979 with the passing of the Overseas Students Charge Act 1979.77 This transitions away from scholarships where the cost of education for overseas students was borne by tax payers to being borne by students through a student fees78, although initially specified the maximum fees that could be levied on international students. The ability for universities to charge a fee one of several stepping-stones to the liberalised free for all evident today where universities are able to set fees that the international student market will bear. 1980s’ iterations of States Grants Acts make reference to overseas students,79 but it would be an exaggeration to suggest that global developments in higher education have exerted an adaptive pressure on this suite of financing instruments.

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We begin to see a more explicit recognition of Australian higher education’s global relevance with the introduction of explicit objects within HEFA in 1992. This first takes the form of deploying research capacity to “national economic development and international competitiveness”.80 These objects extended beyond competitiveness with the introduction of HESA to recognise the distinctive role of universities to community benefit: “the application of knowledge and discoveries to the betterment of communities in Australia and internationally”.81

Neither HEFA nor HESA statements of purpose are particularly attuned to the growing significance of international students, but international references within both Acts increase across time. HEFA includes 10 mentions of the word “overseas” when enacted in 1988.82 This rises to 23 within HESA at the point at which it is introduced,83 and 106 references in HESA in 2020.84 Contemporary references include content relevant to overseas students, and for Australian students seeking to study overseas, overseas campuses of Australian universities, and income-contingent loan debts held by debtors now residing overseas. Succinct, narrowly focused references have become more complex across time, representing the propensity of higher education to absorb more functions and expectations of society, particularly those relating to global student and graduate mobility.

This assessment of international references within HEFA and HESA understates the contemporary significance of international student mobility on Australian (and global) higher education. Over one-third of students in 2019 were overseas fee-paying students,85 and in 2018 overseas fee-paying revenue represented 26% of all university revenue.86 The adaptive pressure associated with this volume of students and revenue might seem to be a key consideration in this study of heredity, but the relevance of this global influence is diminished within this dissertation for the reasons that follow.

First, the research design places emphasis on financing legislation; the scope of which is refined by a focus on HEFA and HESA. These Acts are primarily concerned with allocation of funding for domestic students. The key drivers of change within these and earlier Acts are therefore more concerned with financing the participation of domestic students. Had the scope included other legislation, such as the Education Services for Overseas Students Act 2001 Cth, which is concerned wholly with international education, more commentary on international education would be warranted and aligned with the research design. Nonetheless, one might expect to see an increase in adaptive pressure within financing legislation had overseas students not become such a significant feature of higher education. With deregulated overseas student fees, higher education operates on higher margins that cross-subsidise research and teaching of domestic students.87 The risks of over-reliance on international student revenue has been acutely felt by Australian universities in 2020.88 It is not implausible to see that the resulting financing pressures will catalyse a range of amendments to HESA as a result.

Turning attention from global mobility in higher education to major global contextual developments, there are unexpectedly few references within legislation to this global perspective. There are vestiges of the Great War in legislation. The University of Melbourne allows degrees to be conferred on those who died in service in 1916.89 Additional references are hard to find; some memorial funding is legislated a quarter century after armistice.90 The Re-establishment and Employment Act 1945 enabled returned service personnel to access

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universities but makes no specific references to universities. States Grants Acts, whose genesis is the aftermath of World War II, are silent on the massive global shock that catalysed the Commonwealth’s involvement.

To see the impact of these mega-influences over higher education, one must look not to the legislation itself but to changing patterns in legislation. The adaptive pressure arising from these global developments is indisputable, but their impact is not clearly observable within legislative text itself. The Commonwealth’s first indirect legislative foray into higher education was the establishment of the Institute of Science and Industry Act 1920, motivated less by the war than a desire to rebuild the economy in its aftermath. In doing so, the relationship between the war, investment in universities and the economy is neatly described in the Bill’s second reading speech:

It is said that war is the foundation of all the arts and sciences that belong to mankind. If that be so, we have surely had sufficient war recently to have brought into existence a great many new arts and sciences. I am satisfied that if our people generally will apply the arts and sciences to undertakings in Australia, we shall very soon, find our affairs in a very prosperous condition.91

There is nothing within the legislative text of the Institute of Science and Industry Act that might suggest it is the product of war, but artefacts at key stages of the policy process make clear that this is the basis of its origin. A similar proposition is evident in other key stages in the development of Australian higher education. States Grants Acts are a product of World War II, but this features as subtext through reference to reconstruction training schemes rather than embedding references to war within the legislative detail. The legislative heredity of higher education is clearly shaped by global developments, but these do not feature strongly within the text of the legislation itself.

It’s the Economy, Stupid!

The heredity of higher education is embodied in its legislative detail, and the analysis of which provides insights into patterns of change across time. Legislatures traverse a similar path in their own way, but in doing so repeat a cycle of integrating more functions into higher education with ever-increasing detail, subject to intermittent consolidation. Higher education theory-derived explanations of change each find a way into legislation to varying degrees. Morality and God have all but disappeared from financing legislation. The disciplinary basis for the organisation of knowledge was, for a time, a clearly observed feature of financing legislation’s complexity as it integrated more and more disciplines. The prominence of disciplines has faded as the higher education system has matured. Social demand for higher education has clearly increased across time, although the primary rationale for the passage of significant higher education is a real or presumed increase in demand for skilled labour, with social equity a close but second order companion.

Over recent decades, the legislative detail associated with social and economic demand (an increase in income-contingent loan variants) has allowed the Commonwealth to support a widening of participation whilst limiting the fiscal impact. More recent expansion of student places has occurred within what is primarily a “one size fits all” unified national system. There have been unsuccessful efforts to catalyse genuine structural reform, with short-lived grant variants targeting collaboration, diversity, structural reforms and structural adjustment. The

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Commonwealth now operates as the dominant funder of the system, and it expects universities to serve society’s needs. These needs are primarily economic, moderated by social considerations. The big global shocks of the Great War, World War II and the 1970s stagflation have each had a legislative consequence, but this is not visibly integrated within legislation. The major global development that has found a multifaceted home in Australian higher education financing legislation is that of international global student mobility. The relative prominence of the economy, and relevance of other adaptive pressures, is depicted in Figure 12.

Figure 12. Heredity and Higher Education Adaptive Pressures

PUBLIC POLICY PERSPECTIVES ON ADAPTIVE PRESSURE

A higher education theory-informed analysis of adaptive pressures shaping heredity has proven useful for describing patterns of change in legislation across time. There remains, however, an unexplained phenomenon that motivated this research. In seeking to understand change in higher education, it remains unclear as to why Australian higher education financing legislation has been so prone to change. The extent of Australia’s world-class tinkering has been documented in preceding sections and chapters, but the fundamental reasons for the level of legislation introduction and amendment remain unclear. Subsequent sections look to public policy literature relating to policy change for insights into Australia’s pattern of higher education financing reform. Relevant models and ideas describing change and stability in public policy were outlined in Chapter Three, on pages 46 to 51. As a precursor to this analysis, key features of higher education financing legislation from 1850 to 2020 are briefly re-described from a public policy perspective.

A Public Policy History of Higher Education Financing Legislation

Australian higher education began with the establishment of the University of Sydney in 1850 as an Act of the New South Wales colonial legislature. This Act embedded a fixed annual

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allocation of public funds to the university augmented by student fees. Over subsequent decades, other universities were established by other state legislatures adopting a similar policy model of a university Act, embedding a fixed annual allocation augmented by student fees. This represents a form of path dependency in policy approach. This path dependency is not at odds with variation in the micro details of key phrasing nor jurisdiction-specific sequence of higher education legislation described in previous chapters.

This fixed endowment was insufficient for accommodating the expansionist tendencies of universities. Additional legislation was required to fund the building of the university, to support the establishment of new disciplines, accommodate more students through scholarships, and refine university governance. This additional legislation has taken multiple forms, including university-specific Acts, Acts that served university and other purposes, and, more broadly, whole-of-government Appropriation Acts. Activities funded beyond the core endowment were at times supported through time-limited appropriations subject to precarious whims of the legislature. At various points, items funded through additional legislation were integrated and consolidated, coinciding with an increase in core endowment and an accumulation of governance and accountability-related text.

At the midpoint of the 20th century, the Commonwealth became a more active feature of the higher education policy landscape. In 1951, the Commonwealth introduced legislation in which time-bound and generally triennial grants were allocated to the states on the expectation that funding would flow directly to universities. The amounts of funding established an algorithmic approach, with university financing calculated on the basis of historical patterns of Commonwealth scholarship and research grants, states grants and student fees. This, too, establishes a path dependency with triennial grants retained as the key financing mechanism for the next four decades. Triennial grants span a period in which many universities were established, the binary system for higher (and tertiary) education was introduced, the Commonwealth took full responsibility for financing higher education, there were demonstrable ebbs and flows of economic development with the post-war boom and stagflation, and transition from elite to mass levels of higher education participation.

The pattern evident in state legislatures was repeated at the Commonwealth level, albeit in ways that were relevant to the Commonwealth’s legislative approach. Commonwealth States Grants legislation also reflected the expansionist tendencies of universities. Grants Acts demonstrated a proliferation in the schedules of funding. These schedules progressively extended from operating grants to encompass a wide range of grants supporting buildings, research and students in need.

The States Grants were displaced by HEFA and then HESA, and saw university financing tied even more closely to formula-driven funding arrangements, collapsing both the binary system and a large number of specific grant schedules. The transition from mass to universal levels of participation was financed through the establishment of income-contingent loans and greater responsibility for financing of higher education by students. University funding was based on student enrolments in specific disciplines, funded on historic patterns of teaching costs, and variable Commonwealth and student contributions based on private rates of return. The pattern of proliferation in this era shifted from accommodating expansionist tendencies through specified grants to proliferation of the purposes for which student income-contingent

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loans were permissible. Each variant of income-contingent loans were associated with elaborate terms and conditions that increased the page length of HESA considerably.

This framing of higher education financing legislation glosses over much nuance and detail, but in broad terms highlights that there have been three discrete legislative approaches to Australian higher education. First, the period spanning 1850 to 1950, in which university funding was associated with the states’ university Acts, augmented with other public funds delivered through various items of financing legislation, including Appropriation Acts. Second, the onset of Commonwealth financing in the form of States Grants Acts, establishing a time-bound and generally triennial approach to financing that was maintained for the next four decades. This financing mechanism progressively replaced financing delivered through state financing legislation. The third and final phase saw States Grants Acts replaced with HEFA and then HESA, with the primary financing mechanism entwined with the introduction of income-contingent loans and other specified grants.

Each of these three phases of financing legislation represents a legislation sub-system that incorporates a significant level of legislative activity that has contributed to system growth and complexity. Over 300 items of state financing legislation were identified in the university Act phase spanning 1850 to 1950. Over 175 items of Commonwealth financing legislation were identified in the States Grants phase. Together, HEFA and HESA have been amended 126 times: HEFA was amended 40 times between 1988 to 2003 (and another 16 times thereafter); and HESA has been amended 70 times since 2003. This clustering of Acts within these phases allows for analysis of influences contributing to the legislative activity evident within each phase, and transition between phases to be undertaken from a public policy theoretical perspective.

Stability and Reform Across Financing Legislation Sub-Systems University Acts

There is an extensive public policy literature that seeks to explain patterns of stability and reform. Well-theorised and broadly cited models of reform were described in Chapter Three, page 48. The three phases can be restated through this public policy lens and begin with a critical juncture that established a path dependency through the establishment of the University of Sydney. Critical junctures have been defined as the establishment of a particular policy choice amongst various alternatives.92 Key features present in the establishment of the University of Sydney were maintained as other universities were progressively established across other states and territories over the following century. This juncture was not absolute, however, and whilst each state established a university, there were meso and micro differences in the ways in which universities were established. The commonalities and differences across jurisdictions were described in-depth in Chapter Five. The commonalities between jurisdictions, and maintenance of core features within jurisdictions across time, can be understood as a path dependency. Again, path dependencies are not absolute, and as Krücken suggests, there is a need to consider both the process of continued adaptation and points of discontinuity.93 This need partially satisfied the model of heredity outlined in this dissertation. The incremental adaptation and points of marked discontinuities can be readily tracked and assessed within the policy rules of higher education financing legislation.

One readily identified form of incremental adaptation is in supplemental funding to base university endowment. The university’s initial endowment of £5,000 per annum was unlikely

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to sustain the university in perpetuity unless it was to be funded by private means, and would result in an ever-diminishing proportion of public funding. Some overseas universities have been established without a public policy critical juncture and are less reliant on public funding. Harvard University, for example, is a private institution, and in 2019 only 11.4% of the operating income was derived from Federal funds. This public funding is principally for public health-related research grants.94 The bulk of Harvard’s funding was derived from interest on its investments, over US$2 billion of investment returns were made available for operations, constituting 38.6% of Harvard’s operating income.95

The insufficiency of the base endowment to cover costs over the medium term contributed to a pattern in which new financing legislation was introduced, or existing financing legislation was amended in the years following the introduction of a university in every jurisdiction. This holds true for each jurisdiction except South Australia (Table 8).

Table 8. Items of Financing Legislation Passed by Legislature by Decade, 1850 to 1950

NB: Shaded cells represent the decade in which a new university was established.

Decade New South Wales Victoria South

Australia Tasmania Queensland Western Australia

University Established

1850 1949 1853 1874 1889 1909 1911

1850–1859 5 5 1

1860–1869 2 4

1870–1879 4 5 3 2

1880–1889 12 8 2 6

1890–1899 10 9 0 11

1900–1909 12 8 0 11 2 2

1910–1919 16 12 1 12 8 7

1920–1929 11 7 5 12 13 6

1930–1939 6 4 4 8 11 5

1940–1950 6 6 7 6 11 5

Australia’s world-class tinkering appears to be a feature of the public origins of the system. The conventional narrative of Australian higher education is that there was little of substance that occurred pre-World War II, and anything of substance arose in its aftermath. Over 300 items of legislation were passed in this century, across which the states established Australian higher education, with sustained legislative activity arising in the immediate aftermath of a university’s establishment. South Australia is an anomaly in this regard. No legislation was passed that directly influenced university finances from 1874 and 1911; the point at which the annual grant was next increased.96 The absence of adaptive pressure evident in the South Australian context can be attributed to the basis of the University of Adelaide’s establishment; philanthropic bequest catalysing a state response, rather than independent action of the legislature. The embedded financing mechanism of state payments equivalent to interest on the bequest can also be seen as a comparatively weak engagement in university affairs from

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the South Australian legislature. To again quote Mr Anthony’s comments during the 1923 debate about increases in funding, weak social demand and weak political aspiration for a more expansive South Australian higher education system is evident:

I think it will be found on inquiry that the Universities in the other States are far more richly endowed than the Adelaide University, and they also get more liberal support from their respective Governments. We, however, have a much smaller population and must therefore cut our garment according to our cloth97

South Australia did eventually ramp up investment in higher education, and by the 1940s the shift from a university serving the needs of an agricultural state towards more complex community and professional demands is evident. This placed adaptive pressure on the maximum grant that consolidated discrete additional appropriations into a larger endowment. The additional appropriations were evident in the second reading speech for 1943 legislation that saw the maximum grant increase from £30,000 to £40,000.98 The second reading speech cited an auditor general’s report into university finances and provided a clearer view of the totality of and proliferation of government funding beyond the basic grant amount, although embedded within departmental expenditure, and additional resourcing for the Waite Research Institute. These appropriations parallel developments in other states, funding scholarships, evening classes and disciplinary positions:

“Night classes in faculty of arts £3,000 Tutorial classes £2,250 Salary professor of pathology £600 Expenses of management £14,000 Agricultural research at Waite institute £15,000 Maximum grant in Uni Adelaide Act £30,000 Statutory grant £4,000 Total £68,850”99

The ministerial description of the auditor general’s report also refers to benchmarking of student fee revenue and the level of student fees between states, and staff salaries across disciplines and across states. This highlights concern for national consistency within a state context, and pre-empting discourse on this matter as the Commonwealth increases its involvement in higher education over the coming decades.

The critical juncture of establishing a public university appears to create a path dependency of continued legislative activity within the legislation sub-system established. This legislative activity includes amendments to the university Act, Acts funding university and other purposes, and Appropriation Acts, but never fundamentally changes the centrality of the university Act to financing. Intermittent consolidation of funding steams, where evident, occurs primarily within the university Act rather than other financing variants. The consolidation of funding into university Acts from other legislation was described for New South Wales and Victoria in Chapter Six. The consolidation of funding from departmental appropriations into the university Act is outlined above for South Australia. Tasmania, whilst initially consolidating funding within the “Tasmanian Contribution” of Appropriation Acts, also integrates additional funding within the larger endowment in the university Act.100

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Commonwealth Funding from States Grants (Universities) Acts to HEFA and HESA

The transition to Commonwealth funding has been explored in some detail in Chapter Five. This marks a deviation from the path dependency and legislation sub-system that operated across the states. Rather than funding universities through an endowment (plus other funding streams), funding was directed to universities via the states through a new form of legislation. Grants constructed through an algorithm then allocated funds to universities on a time-bound and generally triennial basis, which set a new path dependency that operated for the next 40 years. The Dawkins reforms introduced income-contingent loans as a new financing mechanism that remain as a dominant feature of system funding today.

This transition between phases, and rare departures from path dependencies of university Acts, and States Grants Acts, can be assessed from the perspective of models of policy reform. One can overlay the introduction of States Grants (Universities) Acts and subsequent patterns of this form of legislation with features of Advocacy Coalition Framework, Punctuated Equilibrium Theory and Multiple Streams. Assessment of “best fit” of these models to the observed transitions cannot be portrayed as definitive. Comprehensive analysis of stability and change is complex enough to justify a stand-alone dissertation; a task undertaken by Monear in case study analysis of several states across America.101 The following sections attempt a condensed assessment of these models in pursuit of insight into why each new legislation sub-system established to fund Australian higher education has then been so prone to frequent levels of legislative activity.

Comprehensive rationality is prominent in public policy literature as a means of understanding patterns of stability and change in public policy.102 The policy process from this framing is presumed to be rational and deliberate, with policy actors operating within an orderly policy cycle. Legislation in this context is the result of a deliberate, carefully constructed response to well-articulated policy problems. However, policy actors face time, information processing and cognitive constraints, and policymaking is complex and messy as a result. Rhetoric around the use of “evidence-based policymaking” often understates the challenges of translating evidence into policy.103 Decades of climate science and data that fails to produce meaningful consensus on policy choice within Australian public policy is an example of the failure of compelling evidence to influence policy. This bounded rationality contributes to shortcuts and heuristics to information processing to inform action and choice that can become normalised through institutionalism and path dependency.

That each key financing phase identified spans decades gives legitimacy to a bounded rationality and the path dependency explanations for observed patterns in higher education financing legislation. The re-imagining of system financing legislation from one dominant model to another is rare. Only two points of change are evident in patterns of higher education legislation since system origin: the onset of Commonwealth triennial grant funding marks the point at which Commonwealth responsibility for higher education is made possible through the legislative device and instrument of States Grants Acts; and creation of the unified national system through HEFA. This claim does not deny that significant change occurred within these phases (e.g. establishment of the binary system, or abolition of student fees under Whitlam). Indeed, the level of legislative activity through States Grants Acts ramps up considerably around the time of the Murray report (see page 118). These changes, however, did not fundamentally shift the way in which financing legislation was constructed, nor disrupt

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the pattern of frequent legislative activity observed across each phase. The legislative sub-system of state grants began in 1951, even if its significance in financing was not fully realised until the late-1950s.

This juxtaposition of stability in legislative phase, and policy changes within the legislative phase, result in a conceptual challenge when seeking to define patterns of stability and change. What type of change counts as significant? What non-arbitrary thresholds might one apply to categorise change as significant or insignificant? These challenges contributed to a focus on legislation within this dissertation. The administrative rules change, or they stay the same, can be tracked with relative ease, and have not been the focal point for analysis in the literature. The legislative framing allows one to sidestep questions of the relevance of the binary system and Whitlam’s fee abolition as dynamic features of the higher education policy cycle arising within a legislation sub-system of state grants. Other literature has explored these specific developments at great length. The legislative framing allows for examination of transitions between legislation sub-systems to assess the validity of policy change models for patterns of legislation in Australian higher education.

If the Advocacy Coalition Framework was to be a valid description of transitions from university Acts to state grants and HESA, one might expect to see evidence of significant policy advocacy based on shared beliefs associated with the transition between phases. If Punctuated Equilibrium Theory was to be a more valid abstraction of events, one might observe changes in expenditure much higher than incremental budgetary changes coinciding with an increase in policy attention being directed to higher education problems. If Multiple Streams were a more valid explanation, one might expect to see the alignment of policy problem, solution and favourable political context.

A history of university advocacy through the Australian Vice-Chancellors’ Committee104 provides some insights into the extent to which the university sector operated as a successful advocacy coalition, or were able to elevate the importance of higher education as a policy matter requiring attention, or were instrumental in forging the policy solution to emergent policy problems. In the lead up to the introduction of the States Grants (Universities) Act in 1951, the Menzies government curtailed the power and interests of vice-chancellors, stopping university preferences for an independent grants committee in their tracks. This suggests a weak and ineffective form of policy advocacy. There is evidence of vice-chancellors advocating for a solution to the policy problem of universities needing additional funding, but the policy and legislation that result are different to the underlying intent. The initial impact on university funding is below the threshold of a disruptive shift in the funding equilibrium. Commonwealth Budget papers from 1949 to 1952 highlight a general decline in funding rather than boon to university finances arising from the passage of the States Grants Act (Table 9). The contraction in funding associated with the decline in reconstruction training scholarships catalyses the need for some form of replacement funding, but the replacement remains far from the peak of scholarship expenditure. This provides weak evidence for an immediate discontinuity to any equilibrium punctuated by the States Grants Act, and indeed can be seen as a mechanism to maintain stasis in funding rather than immediate funding increase.

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Table 9. Commonwealth Budget Expenditure, Select Categories, 1949 to 1953

Budget Year

Reconstruction University Training

Financial Assistance for Universities – Grants to States

1949–1950105 £3,230,694

1950–1951106 £2,390,05

1951–1952107 £1,594,96

1952–1953108 £509,583 £1,473,461

If there is weak evidence of an effective advocacy coalition and punctuations to a policy equilibrium, this leaves the multiple streams explanation as a potentially valid model of describing the transition from university Acts to the States Grants Acts. The policy problem of declining university revenue is readily quantified, and the policy solution of grants that peg Commonwealth grants to a fraction of state contributions is consistent with the political context exemplified by the Prime Minister’s comments at the Bill’s second reading:

The universities are not to be converted into Commonwealth universities. It is of great importance that they should retain their individuality and their local character and quality.109

This state-centric view of universities did not create a path dependency, and over subsequent years the Commonwealth played a progressively more substantive role culminating in the referral of state constitutional powers for higher education in 1974.

A similar analytical approach can be put forward for the transition from States Grants to HEFA in 1988. The advocacy positions put forward by the Australian Vice-Chancellors’ Committee during the policy consultation process leading to HEFA was as effectual as that deployed in 1951.110 Government officials at the time of the Dawkins reforms referred to Vice-Chancellors as “hopeless in negotiation”.111 This is far from a compelling validation of the Advocacy Coalition Framework being deployed by some of the most “powerful” figures in higher education at major changes to financing legislation design in Australian higher education. The funding story for higher education with HEFA does readily quantify a shift in funding that coincided with the introduction of HEFA. A forensic accounting of the changes is not straightforward given differences in nomenclature utilising within budget papers during this transition (tertiary education, higher education and universities) and differences in presentation of financial information across budget years. Variations include Commonwealth aggregate data, and disaggregated data by funding streams and or states’ receipt of funds. Nonetheless, the period from 1988 to 1993 saw Commonwealth expenditure increase by 30%.112 This can be seen as a discontinuity in system funding. The essence of punctuated equilibrium is one of policy actors gaining policy attention that then catalyses a discontinuous policy response. Much has been made of HEFA arising from a unique political figure: Minister Dawkins, the dogged enabler of reform, irrespective of policy coalitions or policy monopolies

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resistant to change. Dawkins’ role and impact is described in No end of a lesson113 and his strength of character is articulated in the agenda setting Green Paper:

Many within the system do accept the need for rapid change, and I have been heartened already to receive their encouragement and support of the Government’s directions. On the other hand, there are those who have a vested interest in protection of the status quo, regardless of the wider national interest.114

Dawkins himself might be considered as the convergence of multiple streams, creating the political context, framing the policy solution and responding to a well-understood and documented problem. All in the face of considerable resistance from various policy actors and groupings with a vested interest in maintaining the status quo.

This by no means authoritative account suggests that multiple streams is a more plausible explanation of the transition points evident from university Acts to States Grants Acts to HEFA. These transitions still fail to account for the subsequent policy tinkering that is evident. The common feature across each transition point is the fact that the legislation sub-system is established by a form of financing legislation rooted in the budgetary constraints and assumptions of the short term. Governor FitzRoy’s intervention (see page 76), and recommendation of the inclusion of an endowment, transformed the University of Sydney Bill from university legislation to university financing legislation; the critical juncture that ensured that modest public funding would never stretch to perpetuity. Menzies’ intervention to introduce a Commonwealth contribution augmenting the states’ primary responsibility for higher education was equally unlikely to stand the test of time. The triennial grant structure was another critical juncture that at the very least necessitated the passage of additional legislation every three years. In reality, there was an average of 2.8 States Grants Acts passed per year from 1951 to 1988; some nine times more legislation than the minimum requirement. The intervention of Dawkins to replace triennial grants for funding across a long list of funding schedules with HECS introduced an interdependence with the taxation system that provided a new avenue for tinkering and adjustment catalysed by legislation previously far removed from higher education. Dawkins was perhaps the most expansion-focused policy actor at each transition point, establishing a system designed to grow. Even with this expansionist design feature, HEFA and HESA have necessitated frequent amendments to sustain the level of expansion of participation that is observed. In the case of university Acts, state grants and HEFA/HESA, no legislation sub-system has been established that has been flexible enough to support higher education over the medium term without a degree of policy tinkering.

ADAPTIVE PRESSURES AND HEREDITY SUMMARY OF FINDINGS

This chapter considered the two cycles that comprise the heredity of higher education in sequence: adaptive pressure arising from intrinsic features of higher education; and adaptive pressure arising from public policy processes. Patterns of legislative change were considered from the inside out, from internal belief in God through to global higher education systems. Religious belief, disciplines, the university, economic and social demand, and global developments in higher education were all found to have exerted some influence over higher education legislation, with economic demand contextualised by social considerations found to be the dominant driver of legislation over the last 75 years. This contributes to an understanding of why higher education legislation changes, but not why it changes with the observed frequency in the Australian context. In assessing policy reform in strict legislative

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terms, only three phases of higher education legislation are observed for the 600+ items of legislation considered. Each phase of higher education legislation represents a discrete legislative sub-system. Analysis of transition points between sub-systems suggest that they create a critical juncture for subsequent policymaking that inevitably leads to a level of policy activity.

Addressing higher education and public policy adaptive pressures separately and in sequence is necessary to step through the mass of datapoints and information in a theoretically informed and incisive manner, but there remains a need to bring these perspectives together. The heredity model is, at its core, an integrated higher education and public policy cycle. The adaptive pressures derived from higher education and public policy theory can integrate into a coherent whole.

An elite model of higher education was established “for God and morality” by university Acts through legislation. The financing mechanism of the university Act grew as it accumulated disciplines, buildings, students and purposes. This accumulation was evident within the university Act, and other legislation, but funding was eventually consolidated within the Act. Rising economic and social demand for higher education, consistent with a transition to mass higher education, created the policy problem of an insufficiency of public resources to fund and sustain this growth. State legislatures lacked the means of financing this growth over the longer term.

The Commonwealth resolved this policy problem temporarily, initially through reconstruction scholarships, and then as a minority funding partner through a new triennial states’ grants financing mechanism. Across time, States Grants Acts also accumulated content through supporting disciplines, buildings, students and purposes. As time passed, however, the interconnection between universities and the economy grew, and states’ grants also became more complicated and stretched in their utility for accommodating economic and social demand for higher education. This challenge was exemplified by the level of detail contained in states’ grants, and legislative provision for trivial equipment like data projectors alongside massive infrastructure projects, as described on page 119.

As the mass higher education system continued to grow and expand, there remained fundamental limitations on how economic and social demand could be accommodated. Notwithstanding attempted advocacy by vice-chancellors, this was ineffectual in the face of a dogged political figure who consolidated the wheat and chaff of funding tables presented within states’ grants into a new legislation sub-system of HEFA. The defining characteristic of HEFA being its integration with the taxation system via the income-contingent loan. Like university Acts and States Grants Acts – legislative sub-systems of the past – HEFA accumulated legislative complexity as it transmogrified into HESA. New details were not the new disciplines and buildings evident in the past, but new forms of income-contingent loan, vastly swelling its page length and influencing the level of policy churn. This integrated description of higher education and public policy adaptive pressures mediating heredity is depicted in Figure 13.

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Figure 13. Heredity and Higher Education and Policy Adaptive Pressures

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1 Simon Marginson, “High participation systems of higher education,” The Journal of Higher Education, 87, no. 2 (2016): 243–271.

2 Ibid.

3 Matt Brett, Equity Performance and Accountability (National Centre for Student Equity in Higher Education, Curtin University, 2018), 19.

4 Hannah Forsyth, A history of the modern Australian university (NewSouth Publishing, 2014),. 1.

5 Simon Marginson, “The worldwide trend to high participation higher education: Dynamics of social stratification in inclusive systems,” Higher Education, 72, no. 4 (2016): 413–434.

6 Burton Clark, On higher education: Selected writings, 1956–2006 (Johns Hopkins University Press 2008), I.

7 David Elder, House of Representatives Practice, 7th Edition (Department of the House of Representatives 2018), 361.

8 Sir David Watson, The question of conscience. Higher education and personal responsibility (Institute of Education Press, London, 2014), 1.

9 Clark Kerr, The uses of the university (Harvard University Press, 2005), 8.

10 Ronald Barnett, “The coming of the ecological university,” Oxford Review of Education, 37, no. 4 (2011): 439–455.

11 Australian Bureau of Statistics, 1297.0 – Australian and New Zealand Standard Research Classification (ANZSRC) (Australian Bureau of Statistics, 2020).

12 Australian Bureau of Statistics, Australian Standard Research Classification: A set of classifications for R&D projects (Australian Bureau of Statistics, 1993).

13 Appropriation Act of 1877 No 15a (NSW), 64.

14 Appropriation Act 1928 No 4 1928 (NSW), 41.

15 Appropriation Act of 1889 No 33a (NSW), 145.

16 Appropriation Act of 1884 No 42a (NSW), 131.

17 Appropriation Act 1912 No 50 (NSW), 702.

18 An Act to apply a sum out of the Consolidated Revenue to the service of the year ending on the thirtieth day of June One thousand eight hundred and ninety and to appropriate the Supplies granted in this Session of Parliament (No MXLIIL) 1889 (Vic), 212.

19 An Act to apply a sum out of the Consolidated Revenue to the service of the year ending on the thirtieth day of June One thousand nine hundred and to appropriate the Supplies granted in this Session of Parliament (No 1653) 1900 (Vic), 406.

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20 An Act to apply a sum out of the Consolidated Revenue to the service of the year ending on the thirtieth day of June One thousand nine hundred and eleven and to appropriate the Supplies granted in this Session of Parliament (No 2283) 1910 (Vic), 257.

21 States Grants (Universities) Act 1951 (Cth), s.4.(1).(b).

22 States Grants (Universities) Act (No 2) 1973 (Cth).

23 States Grants (Universities) Act (No 3) 1973 (Cth).

24 Higher Education Funding Act 1988 (Cth), s.24., s. 25.

25 Higher Education Funding Act 1988 (Cth), Compilation C2004C04463.; incorporating amendments arising from: Higher Education Legislation Amendment Act 2002, No 112 of 2002 (Cth), s.23A, s.23B, s.23BA.

26 Ibid, s.23.

27 Higher Education Legislation Amendment Act 1996 No 74 of 1996 (Cth) s.7.

28 Higher Education Support Act 2003 (Cth) s. 30–15.

29 Department of Education, Skills and Employment, Job-ready Graduates Discussion Paper (Department of Education, Skills and Employment, 2020), document created, 19 June 2020, https://www.dese.gov.au/document/job-ready-graduates-discussion-paper.

30 David John Frank and John W. Meyer. "Worldwide expansion and change in the university." Towards a multiversity (2007): 19-44.

31 Department of Education, Allocation of units of study to funding clusters and student contribution bands according to Field of Education Codes for 2009 (Department of Education, 2013), document created 11 December 2013, https://docs.education.gov.au/node/34641.; Department of Education and Training, 2020 Allocation of units of study to funding clusters (Department of Education and Training, 2019), document created, 18 June 2019, https://docs.education.gov.au/node/52911.

32 Burton Clark, The higher education system: Academic organization in cross-national perspective (University of California Press, 1983), 214–216.

33 Simon Marginson and Mark Considine, The enterprise university: Power, governance and reinvention in Australia (Cambridge University Press, 2000).

34 Burton Clark, On higher education: Selected writings, 1956–2006 (Johns Hopkins University Press 2008), 499.

35 Clark, The higher education system: Academic organization in cross-national perspective, 186–187.

36 Kerr, The uses of the university, 29.

37 Ibid.

38 Clark, On higher education: Selected writings, 1956–2006, 501.

39 Burton R. Clark, Creating Entrepreneurial Universities: Organizational Pathways of Transformation. 1st ed. Issues in Higher Education (Pergamon Press, 1998).

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40 A google Ngram of the phrase term “entrepreneurial universities” sees a marked increase in references to this phrase from 1996 onwards.

41 Higher Education Funding Amendment Act (No 1) 1997, No 125, 1997 (Cth) s.6.

42 Higher Education Support Act 2003 (Cth) s.41–10.(1).9.

43 Details of funding directed to business collaboration such as Sponsorship of Business – Higher Education Round Table Annual Awards included in: Department of Education Science and Training, “Delegate approval of determination no 544. Approval of Grants for Other Grants in 2005 payable under section 41–35 of the Higher Education Support Act 2003 (the Act) (Collaboration and Structural Reform Programme)” HEIMS Online Institution Payment Information. (Department of Education and Training, 2019), retrieved 29 September 2020, https://app.heims.education.gov.au/HeimsOnline/IPInfo/Determination.

44 Higher Education Legislation Amendment (2007 Budget Measures) Act 2007 (No 119, 2007) (Cth).

45 Higher Education Support Amendment (2009 Budget Measures) Act 2009 (No 86, 2009) (Cth).

46 Commonwealth, Higher Education Funding Amendment Bill (No 1) 1997. Second Reading Speech, House of Representatives Hansard, 28 May 1997, 4287 (Mr Abbott Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister for Employment, Education, Training and Youth Affairs).

“The program will assist institutions with restructuring and rationalisation activities that will lead to permanent benefits and which are beyond the funding capacity of the institution involved.”

47 Commonwealth, Higher Education Legislation Amendment (2007 Budget Measures) Bill 2007 (No 119, 2007) (Cth) Second Reading Speech, House of Representatives Hansard, 24 May 2007, 12 (Julie Bishop).

“The fund will give more support for structural reform, promoting greater specialisation and diversity.”

48 Commonwealth, Higher Education Support Amendment (2009 Budget Measures) Bill 2009 (No 86, 2009) Second Reading Speech. House of Representatives Hansard, 28 May 2009, 4693 (Julia Gillard).

“The Structural Adjustment Fund will be available to universities and will enable them to develop diverse missions.”

49 Gwilym Croucher and James Waghorne, Australian universities: A history of common cause (UNSW Press 2020).

50 Stephen Parker, “Stephen Parker: higher education changes a ‘fraud on the electorate’,” The Conversation, 2 December 2020.; Michelle Grattan, “Senate torpedoes Pyne’s university deregulation,” The Conversation, 2 December 2020.

51 Australian Government, Driving innovation, fairness and excellence in Australian higher education (Australian Government, Canberra, 2016).

52 Commonwealth of Australia, Mid-year economic and fiscal outlook 2017–18, December 2017, (Commonwealth of Australia, 2017), retrieved 1 October 2020, https://archive.budget.gov.au/2017-18/myefo/MYEFO_2017-18.pdf.

53 Martin Trow, Problems in the transition from elite to mass higher education (Carnegie Commission on Higher Education 1973).

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54 Ibid, 7.

55 Sir David Watson, The question of conscience. Higher education and personal responsibility (Institute of Education Press, London, 2014), 108.

56 Denise Bradley, et al., Review of Australian higher education: Final report (Australian Government Department of Education, Employment and Workplace Relations, Canberra 2008), Chapter 3.1., 15.

57 Ibid, 21.

58 Carol Dow and Carol Kempner, “Meeting the need for higher level skills through tertiary education reform” (Commonwealth of Australia, Parliamentary Library Briefing Book, 2010), document created 12 October 2010, https://www.aph.gov.au/About_Parliament/Parliamentary_Departments/Parliamentary_Library/pubs/BriefingBook43p/tertiaryreform.

59 Commonwealth, Higher Education Support Bill 2003 Second Reading, House of Representatives Official Hansard, Wednesday, 17 September 2003, 20241 (Dr Brendan Nelson).

60 Brendan Nelson, Our universities: Backing Australia’s future (Commonwealth of Australia, 2003), 8:

“A confident, strong, quality higher education sector is vital to Australia’s economic, cultural and social development.”

61 National Archives, Cabinet Paper – Cabinet Submission 5890 – Higher education policy statement – Decisions 11354/SA and 11487 (National Archives Australia 1988), 11.

62 John. S. Dawkins, Higher education: a policy statement (Department of Employment, Education and Training, Australian Government Publishing Service, 1988).

63 Committee on the Future of Tertiary Education in Australia, Tertiary education in Australia, (Committee on the Future of Tertiary Education in Australia, Canberra, ACT: Australian Government Publishing Service, 1964), 1.

64 Committee on Australian Universities, Report of the committee on Australian universities [Murray report] (Commonwealth of Australia, Committee on Australian Universities, Government Printer, Canberra, 1957), 120.

65 University of Melbourne, University of Melbourne Calendar 1951, Annual Report 1950 (University of Melbourne, 1951), 480.

66 Agricultural Education Act 1919 (Vic).

67 Provision for a “development and migration” scheme including bursaries for university fees made in: The Supplementary Appropriation Act, 1929–30 (Tas), 142.

68 Adelaide University Act Amendment Act, 1923 (SA).

69 South Australia, Adelaide University Act Amendment Act (No 1555 of 1923) Second Reading Debates, Legislative Assembly Hansard, 20 September 1923, 610 (Mr Anthony).

70 Trow, Problems in the transition from elite to mass higher education, 25, 32.

71 Frank and Meyer, "Worldwide expansion and change in the university."

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72 Daniel Oakman, Crossing the frontier: Australia, Asia and The Colombo Plan, 1950–1965. (Doctoral Thesis. Australian National University, 2002).

73 Universities (Financial Assistance) Act 1967 (Cth), The Schedule.

74 States Grants (Universities) Act 1976 No 13, 1976 (Cth), Schedule 5.

75 States Grants (Advanced Education Assistance) Amendment Act 1977 (Cth), Schedule 3.

76 International House, Our history, retrieved 1 August 2020, https://ihouse.unimelb.edu.au/about/history.

77 Overseas Students Charge Act 1979 (Cth).

78 Commonwealth, Overseas Students Charge Bill Second Reading, Senate Official Hansard, Thursday, 25 October 1979, 1827 (Sen Don Grimes).

79 States Grants (Tertiary Education Assistance) Amendment Act (No 3) 1985 (Cth); States Grants (Tertiary Education Assistance) Amendment Act (No 2) 1986 (Cth); States Grants (Tertiary Education Assistance) Amendment Act (No 3) 1986 (Cth).

80 Higher Education Funding Amendment Act (No 2) 1992, No 158 (Cth), s. 61.

81 Higher Education Support Act 2003 (Cth) s. 2–1.

82 Higher Education Funding Act 1988 (Cth).

83 Higher Education Support Act 2003 (Cth).

84 Higher Education Support Act 2003 (Cth), Compilation C2020C00197.

85 Department of Education Skills and Employment, “uCube”, retrieved 1 October 2020, http://highereducationstatistics.education.gov.au

86 Department of Education, 2008 - Financial Reports of Higher Education Providers (Department of Education, 2008), document created 11 March 2014, https://docs.education.gov.au/node/35437.: Department of Education and Training, 2018 Higher Education Providers Finance Table (Department of Education and Training, 2018), document created 13 March 2020, https://docs.education.gov.au/node/53363.

87 Simon Marginson, “Is Australia overdependent on international students?” International Higher Education, 54, (2009): 10-12.

88 Ian Marshman and Frank Larkins, Modelling individual Australian universities resilience in managing overseas student revenue losses from the COVID-19 pandemic (Melbourne Centre for the Study of Higher Education, University of Melbourne, 2020), retrieved 17 June 2020 https://melbourne-cshe.unimelb.edu.au/lh-martin-institute/insights/modelling-individual-australian-universities-resilience-in-managing-overseas-student-revenue-losses-from-the-covid-19-pandemic.

89 University Act 1916 (Vic).

90 Sydney University Engineering School Memorial Lecture Fund Act, 1943 (NSW).

91 Commonwealth, Institute of Science and Industry Bill 1920 (Cth), Second Reading, House of Representatives Hansard, Thursday, 22 July 1920, 2955 (A. Hay).

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92 Sharon Feeney and John Hogan, “A path dependence approach to understanding educational policy harmonisation: The qualifications framework in the European higher education area,” Higher Education Policy, 30, No.3 (2017): 279–298.

93 Georg Krücken, “Learning the ‘New, New Thing’: On the role of path dependency in university structures,” Higher Education, 46, no.3 (2003): 315–339.

94 Harvard University, 2018–19 Annual financial report (Harvard University, 2019), 19, 43, retrieved 1 October 2020, https://www.harvard.edu/sites/default/files/content/fy19_harvard_financial_report.pdf.

95 Ibid, 19.

96 The Adelaide University Act Amendment Act 1911 (SA), s.10.

97 South Australia, Adelaide University Act Amendment Bill (No 1555 of 1923) SA Second Reading Debate, Legislative Assembly Hansard, 20 September 1923, 610 (Mr Anthony).

98 University of Adelaide Act Amendment Act 1942 (SA), s.4.

99 South Australia, University of Adelaide Act Amendment Bill (No 9 of 1943) (SA) Second Reading, Legislative Council Hansard, 27 August 1943, 477 (A. P. Blesing).

100 Tasmanian University Act 1935 (Tas) s. VI.(f).

101 Daryl A. Monear, Explaining stability and upheaval in state-level higher education governance: A multiple-case study analysis using Advocacy Coalition Theory and Punctuated Equilibrium Theory (Doctoral dissertation, University of Washington, 2008).

102 Paul Cairney, Understanding public policy: Theories and issues (Palgrave Macmillan 2012), 283.

103 Paul Cairney, ed, The politics of evidence-based policy making, ed, Paul Cairney (Palgrave Pivot, London, 2016).

104 Croucher and Waghorne, Australian universities: A history of common cause, 83.

105 Parliament of the Commonwealth of Australia, The Budget 1949–1950 (Parliament of the Commonwealth of Australia, 1949), 49. (https://archive.budget.gov.au)

106 Parliament of the Commonwealth of Australia, The Budget 1950–1951 (Parliament of the Commonwealth of Australia, 1950), 48. (https://archive.budget.gov.au)

107 Parliament of the Commonwealth of Australia, The Budget 1951–1952 (Parliament of the Commonwealth of Australia, 1951), 47. (https://archive.budget.gov.au)

108 Parliament of the Commonwealth of Australia, The Budget 1952–1953 (Parliament of the Commonwealth of Australia, 1951), 47, 56. (https://archive.budget.gov.au)

109 Commonwealth, States Grants (Universities) Bill 1951 (Cth) Second Reading Speech, House of Representatives Hansard, 27 November 1951, 2786 (Robert Menzies).

110 Croucher and Waghorne, Australian universities: A history of common cause, 163.

111 Stuart Macintyre, Andre Brett, and Gwilym Croucher, No end of a lesson: Australia’s unified national system of higher education (Melbourne University Publishing 2017), 75.

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112 Ross Williams, “System funding and institutional allocation,” In The Dawkins revolution, 25 years on, eds, Gwilym Croucher et al. (Melbourne University Press), p91–107.

113 Stuart Macintyre, Andre Brett, and Gwilym Croucher, No end of a lesson: Australia’s unified national system of higher education, 55–56.

114 John. S. Dawkins, The challenge for higher education in Australia (Department of Education and Training, Canberra, Australian Government Publishing Service, 1987), 14.

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CHAPTER EIGHT: HEREDITY AND THE FUTURE OF AUSTRALIAN HIGHER EDUCATION

The greatest change in governance now going on is not the rise of student power or faculty power but the rise of public power; the governance of higher education is less and less by higher education and also less for higher education. Just as state budget experts, legislative committees, governors, even the courts, become more involved with the campus, so also will the campus, not just as a whole through its president but often in some of its parts student lobbies and faculty unions, for example become more involved with public authority. The “ivory tower” of yore is now becoming a regulated public utility.

Clark Kerr (1972). The administration of higher education in an era of change and conflict.1

There is a central challenge embedded in the design of Australian higher education financing legislation. Governments cannot invest in higher education to a level that accommodates growth in social, economic or institutional demands. This fundamental design feature contributes to 170 years of internationally distinctive levels of legislative activity. Over time, the price of additional public funding has included more stringent governance and accountability mechanisms. There is intermittent consolidation, and rare legislative sub-system redesign. The policy resolution to the financing challenge has always been temporary. The contemporary outcome of Australian legislatures’ mediation of the financing challenge is one with high overhead costs that impede institutional responsiveness to contextual challenges. The legislative sub-system now overseen by the Commonwealth also impedes government ability to enact and implement reforms. Legislative reform packages were blocked by the Australian Senate in 2014 and 2017, but, third time lucky, more significant amendments to HESA passed the parliament in 2020. The heredity of Australian higher education has evolved to an over-regulated public utility that has proven difficult to manage.

Preceding chapters have highlighted imperfections in our knowledge around higher education legislation and put forward a model that seeks to better define and understand patterns of legislative change. The importance of jurisdictions was described, along with a general trend towards complexity. The adaptive pressures shaping legislation were also assessed. This chapter explores the practical and contemporary relevance of heredity. The first part of this chapter provides a brief heredity-informed diagnosis of pathologies evident in contemporary higher education financing legislation. The second part explores the extent to which these pathologies are an inevitable locked-in path dependency. Consistent with the underlying motivations for this research, an optimistic and idealistic perspective suggests that a new path is plausible. Ashby suggested that it “is for creative writer to try to tell us what the environment of tomorrow’s world will be like”. This dissertation’s insights into the heredity of Australian higher education allow for a plausible utopia to be written of the future. Part evidence-based, part creative imagining.

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THE CURRENT COSTS OF HIGHER EDUCATION LEGISLATION

The University of Sydney Act of 1850 spanned six pages. The table of contents alone for the Higher Education Support Act spans 26 pages. The evolution of financing legislation between 1850 and today has been examined with unprecedented precision within this dissertation. The university Acts that dominated foundational era financing were consistent with an elite level of participation. The onset of Commonwealth States Grants Acts helped transition higher education from elite to mass participation. States Grants Acts were displaced by HEFA and then HESA, positioning the Australian system as a globally distinctive high-participation system on the cusp of universal participation. Each incremental step in this evolution has seen legislation passed or amended to provide additional public money (or regulation of private money) to expand the scale and scope of higher education. The quid pro quo of accountability for public funds, and the elaboration of governance frameworks, have contributed to financing legislation becoming more complex over time. This inherited cycle of public policy and higher education activity results in unproductive and inefficient regulatory burden.

Regulatory Burden

Some 30 years ago, the influential Linke report into Australian higher education performance indicators noted the relationship between system expansion, public funding constraints, performance appraisal and accountability:

Performance appraisal in higher education has become a matter of increasing importance over the past twenty years or so throughout the developed world. The trend in Australia derives mainly from continuing pressures for expansion of higher education associated with general funding constraints. There has emerged a persistent and increasing call for improved efficiency and public accountability in all aspects of higher education.2

The increasing regulatory burden faced by Australian higher education shows no sign of abating. Calls for improved performance appraisal and public accountability have proven to be resilient, successful and costly. There was a concerted focus on red tape and regulation coinciding with the introduction of demand-driven funding, and the establishment of TEQSA as a new higher education regulator. The 2013 review of higher education regulation described the complex regulatory forces faced by the sector and compiled examples of the excessive costs of TEQSA registration.3 The 2012 review of higher education reporting documented the costs associated with reporting data to government to fulfil regulatory requirements. This estimated that 2011 reporting requirements translated into 66,000 staff days and $26 million in expenditure; money that could have been better spent on teaching and research. This may seem like a significant amount, but it is small in the context of sector revenue counted in the billions. The full cost of regulatory compliance has been estimated as being 10 times higher than the review of reporting. Universities Australia estimated that 2011 red tape compliance cost $280 million.4 This could fund a considerable amount of economically and socially productive activity more aligned with the core purposes of higher education.

Reviews of reporting and regulation coincide with significant growth in student participation. Public costs were rising rapidly, and in the aftermath of the global financial crisis there was more political interest in how to contain government expenditure. The reviews of regulation and reporting were commissioned by the Labor government, and there were political points to

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be scored by depicting the government as one whose spending was out of control, and whose socialist instincts were strangling universities with red tape. The then-leader of the opposition and future prime minister made a virtue of “masterly inactivity”, that government should be more “respectful listener than a hands-on manager” of higher education.5

The coalition government took power in 2012 with a commitment to red tape reduction and deregulation. The coalition’s critique of Labor on red tape grounds aligns with stereotypical depictions of the left and the right in Australian politics. Events demonstrated that stereotypes are no sound predictor of government policy priorities. Labor introduced a market-oriented, demand-driven funding system. It was the coalition, however, who: imposed caps on the system;6 introduced new regulatory requirements about freedom of speech;7 made contract cheating unlawful;8 introduced performance-based funding;9 national interest tests for research,10 and intervened in research grant award processes.11

The heredity of higher education appears to be more regulation and interference, no matter which side of politics holds power. Regulation and red tape have generally increased across all sectors of the economy, leading to critique that Australia has become a “red tape state”.12 Higher education is also described as experiencing more regulation and red tape than other sectors.13 As described on page 26, some universities claim compliance obligations with over 200 items of legislation. This level of regulation is both part of an Australian-wide trend towards more complex legislation, and a particular pattern of over-regulation of the higher education sector. Each incremental increase in funding to support a new activity in higher education creates an opportunity for more conditions of funding and more elaborate governance requirements. The origins for this might be traced back to Governor FitzRoy’s initial intervention in the drafting of the University of Sydney Act (see page 76). This enshrined a public endowment in the university’s financing legislation, setting a path dependency for ever-increasing public funding, scrutiny and accountability.

There is, however, a paradox associated with increasing regulation. Universities have proven to be adept at securing alternative revenue sources. Australia’s largest services export has been international education.14 Average revenue per student is significantly higher for fee-paying overseas students than domestic students, with the additional margin allowing for investment in university core functions of research and teaching.15 This private investment in higher education, and higher margins, minimises the Commonwealth contribution to higher education. The proportion of sector revenue derived from direct Commonwealth grants declined from 43% in 2008 to 35% in 2018.16 Even with a decreasing responsibility for funding the sector, the regulatory burden continues to rise, and governments seek to mediate social, economic and political demands through legislative transformation of the sector. One need only look at the growth industry of higher education “intelligence and policy analysts” (quantified on page 34) for evidence that understanding and influencing government policy have become important to the higher education sector. This also brings into focus another cost of the heredity of Australian higher education – the opportunity costs of a parliament distracted by incessant tinkering with higher education.

Parliamentary Distraction

Australian higher education has, over time, played a more critical role in the social and economic affairs of the nation. There are various ways of quantifying the importance of higher education to the economy and assessing whether there is a commensurate level of

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parliamentary scrutiny. Universities Australia policy advocacy documents suggest that universities account for 1.5% of GDP, and the value of the accumulated stock of university research accounts for over 10% of GDP.17 Organisation for Economic and Cultural Development (OECD) figures suggest that 2.0% of GDP is invested in tertiary education; 0.7% of this is derived from public sources, and 1.3% from private sources.18 Higher education represented 2.0% of Commonwealth expenditure in 2018–19.19 This eclectic assortment of higher education statistics might legitimise a level of legislative activity spanning anywhere from 0.7% to 10% of the parliament’s time.

Amendments to HESA between 2003 and 2019 constitute 2.6% of all legislation passed over this period.20 This might be too high, or too low, or just right, depending on the temperature preferences of one’s porridge. Independent scholarly review of Australian higher education policy suggests that this is too high, pointing to instability in higher education policy.21 This policy instability is also evident in the A review of reviews, documenting just some of the major reviews of the sector from the time of Dawkins, each feeding into a relentlessly activated policy cycle, which produces legislative change but questionable sustainable policy reforms.

From the vantage point of this researcher, legislation is a means of achieving a policy objective. Australian higher education’s objectives have transcended God and morality, and now underpin economic prosperity, social cohesion, cultural life and international connectedness. It is legitimate that taxpayers contribute to this objective, and that public investment be commensurate with the role that higher education plays in Australian society. Commonwealth investment in higher education has grown by 2.5 times over the last two decades in nominal terms; a positive statement of Commonwealth support for the sector. However, this growth in investment coincides with a 31% decline in Commonwealth investment in higher education as a proportion of Commonwealth expenditure (Figure 14).

Figure 14. Commonwealth Expenditure on Higher Education, 1999 to 202022

The increase in higher education expenditure can be seen as a contributing factor to Australia’s long run of economic growth. The decrease in Commonwealth support as a proportion of its outlays can be seen through the prism of Trow, and competition for resources

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from other sectors of the economy.23 The declining proportion of Commonwealth investment can also be interpreted through Kerr’s observation that in future, “We need the research universities more but may be able to afford them less.”24

The 70+ amendments to HESA, and the passage of hundreds of other legislative instruments through the Commonwealth Parliament, have proven to be an overall negative for the sector; an incremental pattern of reforms that have reduced the Commonwealth’s relative investment in the sector. This decline in investment is the product of both Labor and coalition government policy choices; a quantifiable trend rather than partisan critique. This could be forgiven if the quid pro quo of declining investment came with the capacity to source private investment and/or net reduction in regulatory overheads. Universities have proven adept at securing international private investment, but less adept at domestic private investment. Access to domestic private investment in higher education continues to face significant regulatory barriers. There are, by comparison, few regulatory barriers to how much private investment can be directed at school education, or other activities that support the skills and knowledge development of Australian citizens. The Commonwealth’s influence over the sector has expanded, whilst investment as a proportion of its budget contracts.

There are, of course, flaws in this logic. Accounting standards vary across time, and Commonwealth investment in higher education is subject to recategorisation.25 Apples in one year may be counted as oranges in another, giving a misleading picture of the time series, if not adjusted. Governments also oscillate between surplus and deficit. A stable investment in a discrete activity can rise and fall in proportionate terms as the government’s overall budget position varies. The quantum of decline drop between the 2018/19 and 2019/20 Final Budget Outcome in Commonwealth investment in higher education as a proportion of total expenditure is largely the result of emergency stimulus measures arising from the pandemic. A similar critique has been applied to the use of comparative OECD data.26 A higher or lower proportion of investment in education can be explained by broader economic shifts (such as the global financial crisis) rather than any fundamental shift in government policy. Much higher education literature gets caught up in advocacy for a higher or lower number in these metrics.27 This advocacy is a distraction this dissertation has deliberately sought to avoid. This research has sought to understand the deeper processes shaping legislation without the research masquerading as an argument for more public money.

The deeper processes mediating the heredity of higher education suggest there is a high probability that major policy reforms will be on the agenda in the 2020s. The global shock of COVID-19 has seen unemployment rise, governments have gone into deep deficit, and key elements of the Australian economy (e.g. international tourism, international education) are unlikely to return to their pre-pandemic levels in the near-term. At least one precondition for major policy reform from Kingdon’s Multiple Streams model is in place. There is a policy problem, and whether the political context is favourable for reform, or whether a policy solution presents itself remain to be seen. One can be sceptical about the favourability or otherwise of the political context. Australia has not demonstrated a capacity to undertake major policy reform over recent decades. The policy tinkering evident in HESA is emblematic of policy gridlock that has made major reform unattainable.28

The Commonwealth Parliament has been distracted by the small and piecemeal, with 2.6% of its time spent fighting minor skirmishes on higher education with little by way of policy

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outcomes consistent with Universities Australia’s preference for stability, sustainability and predictability. One might point to the impact of the Bradley reforms as a major success over the life of HESA, but the centrality of the 40/20 targets have fallen out of favour. The flagship model of demand-driven funding was in place from only 2012 to 2017; a relative blip in the history of the sector. The remaining 97.4% of parliament’s time has not been as productive as many would hope. There is little evidence that progress has been made on major policy challenges that appeal to either side of politics. Little progress has been made in climate change or taxation. Per capita economic growth is suboptimal. The government’s more recent higher education “policy achievements” can be counted as a policy response to confected concerns about free speech. The Institute of Public Affairs (IPA) can claim victory on this concern,29 whilst now turning attention to the pernicious effects of identity politics.30 This agenda is aligned with 2020 Job-ready graduates reform agenda of lower public subsidies for the humanities.31 The IPA’s advocacy for cutting red tape32 has taken a back seat for the moment.

One might let scepticism about the prospect of major reform drift into cynicism by ruminating about the costs of regulatory burden produced by a distracted parliament. The deadweight costs of funding an “axis of policy wonks” and a “bordello of lobbyists”33 whose achievement is a long-term decrease in Commonwealth funding for higher education as a proportion of its overall expenditure by a third. The motivation of this research is optimism not pessimism. The process of generating and sharing new knowledge about the heredity of Australian higher education is inherently exciting. A better understanding of the system’s inheritance and transmissions mechanisms opens up new possibilities for making legislation that is more suitable for Australia’s current and future social, economic, cultural and knowledge needs.

TOWARDS STABLE AND SUSTAINABLE AUSTRALIAN HIGHER EDUCATION FINANCING

Universities Australia advocates for resourcing for higher education teaching and research to be sufficient, sustainable and predictable, such that universities are able to meet various social, economic and political expectations.34 Given Bowen’s “revenue theory of costs”, this advocacy is an impossible dream. There is always more knowledge to be created and discovered. Universities will continue to absorb disciplines and their constituent academic communities’ aspirations for more research to be undertaken than can be accommodated by the finite resourcing available at any point in time. Similarly, the relentless trend toward higher levels of higher education participation suggests that today’s sufficiency of resourcing is tomorrow’s insufficiency, and political trade-offs between the right balance between public and private investment.

The tensions embedded in claims for sufficiency, predictability and sustainability in a context of rising demand for education and an insatiable appetite for research funding have been mediated by Australian Commonwealth, state, territory and colonial parliaments for 170 years. The publicly mediated and financed expansion has produced a sector that all Australians can rightly be proud of. This mediation of supply and demand for higher education has created multiple, and ever-lengthening, strands of legislative DNA. This genotypic inheritance expresses a phenotype that allows the deaf to hear,35 the blind to see,36 and wireless ubiquitous digital communication.37 The genotype is not absolute. The University of Sydney had a secular orientation from its establishment despite espoused intent for advancement of religion and morality. HESA may still include tracts of text describing the moribund policy of VET-FEE HELP, but there is no phenotypic expression of this genetic material.

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This legislative inheritance evolves, with incremental strings of text produced, borrowed and reused across jurisdictions, specific legislation and time. New strands of DNA are produced intermittently, out-competing the legislative sub-systems that once dominated the higher education ecosystem. States Grants Acts saw the death nell of university Acts as the primary financing mechanisms, and HEFA put an end to the highly prescriptive funding tables of States Grants Acts. If the patterns of heredity evident from 1850 to 2020 are repeated, one can expect to see continued evolution of HESA. New functions and priorities will be integrated, adding new governance and accountability requirements. At some point, multiple streams may converge to produce a new strand of legislative DNA that will render HESA a historical legislative anomaly. This pattern of new functions, priorities, governance and accountability is evident with the most recent passage of amendments to HESA.

The Higher Education Support Amendment (Job-Ready Graduates and Supporting Regional and Remote Students) Bill (2020) passed the Australian parliament in October 2020. The Act amends to the objects of HESA to support:

2-1(b)(iv) the engagement with industry and the local community to enable graduates to thrive in the workforce;

This clarification of HESA’s purposes may influence how billions of public funding will be allocated. A new category of “other grant” consistent with this objective is established to support the engagement of universities with industry. These new industry engagement genes and strings of text total 26 words. They are integrated into the existing 106,000 words; additional content of 0.03%. This is hardly the transition to a new legislative sub-system, no matter the level of protestation evident in the engagement of policy actors in the policy process.38 Much of this protestation relates to changes to funding clusters, an artefact of the relative funding model embedded in HESA and HEFA since 1990.39 The changes are a little more than minor tinkering, but nonetheless constitute minor changes to the existing legislative sub-system; the policy equivalent of the introduction of funding bands in 1996 that set differential student contributions (described on page 142). A major point of opposition to the proposed changes is the degree of ministerial discretion that arises from various amendments.40 Universities Australia’s advocacy for predictable funding appears to be eroded by amendments that give a hypothetical future rogue minister more powers to directly intervene in financing of the sector. This development is not inconsistent with Hansard references to the state of University of Sydney finances in 1902, precariously at risk by a “catch vote of the house” (see page 108). The Job-ready reforms are consistent with tinkering of a flawed system, rather than a pathway to stability and sustainability, or transformational change made possible by convergence of multiple streams.

Current policy arrangements of a capped maximum basic grant amount placed the trajectory of Australian higher education on a stable to declining rate of higher education participation and attainment. The Job-ready graduates legislation is in part designed to reduce per-student funding to universities, and increase student contributions to the cost of their study, such that scarce resources can be redeployed to enable more individuals to participate in higher education.41 The trend towards higher levels of participation appears unstoppable. The causal explanations of this trend towards higher participation are well described by the work of Trow and Marginson. More in society will benefit as widening participation catches more and more in higher education’s net. Any insecurity that the higher education personal transformation, of

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which I am the beneficiary, might be unduly limited to others can be put to rest. Governments of all persuasions find a way of supporting system expansion. The rate of expansion might be faster or slower than some policy actors may see as desirable at various points in the time series, but the long-term trend is indisputable.

The continued policy challenge is one of how this expansion can transition to post-universal levels of participation. Universal participation was integrated in Trow’s taxonomy of elite, mass and universal participation. Under universal participation, the majority of students of an age cohort progress to higher education, and flow in and out of higher education through their life as need and circumstance allow. A more fluid system, supporting at least half of the population, with a diversity of institutions and offerings, is poles apart from the elite stage of higher education where university is a rite of passage and is for the preparation of social elites into adult life. Australia has left an elite level of participation far behind but has yet to fully transition to a universal model of provision nor level of participation. One can ponder whether this transition can be achieved and sustained without tying the sector in regulatory knots. There might also be benefits if parliaments were able to respond to core social and economic challenges without the distraction of constant tinkering with the finer points of higher education financing legislation. Much higher education discourse is ensnared in elite system mythology, overtly resistant to the very idea of mass education.42 Heredity-based insights suggest the resolution of this challenge will require a new legislative sub-system. This might consolidate features of HESA and the surrounding policy ecosystem. It might also borrow, reuse and recombine text from other jurisdictions, legislation and time. This new legislative sub-system might better support the transition to post-universal participation. This heredity of Australian higher education financing legislation from 1850 to 2020 is depicted in Figure 15.

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Figure 15. Heredity and the Future of Australian Higher Education Legislation

COMPONENTS OF A POST-UNIVERSAL PARTICIPATION LEGISLATION SUB-SYSTEM

In imagining a post-universal participation legislative framework, it is worth recalling the transition points for other legislative sub-systems. Those designing the University of Sydney could not have imagined they were setting the groundwork for all other universities. The creation of the States Grants Acts had modest aspirations but went on to take over the entire tertiary education system. Dawkins demonstrated more strategic foresight, but the subsequent evolution of the system remade under his watch was not fully aligned with policy objectives. Higher education is bigger and better quality, but the key role of TAFE has not been “recognised and protected” as intended.43

The transition points between legislative sub-systems suggest there are two options. First, policy is made that creates a new sub-system unintentionally rather than by design, and which gradually evolves to be the dominate legislative genotype. Second, policy is made with the deliberate creation of a new sub-system, perhaps only possible with the convergence of

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multiple streams, punctuating the current equilibrium, and navigating the politics of advocacy coalitions working feverously to maintain or disrupt the status quo. There is too much creative writing involved in concocting a new legislative form that might, by stealth and coincidence of events, become a post-universal participation legislative device. Similarly, a “plausible utopia”44 of a deliberate design solution to the pathologies of contemporary policy would be hubris. The insights from heredity are novel, but are an incremental improvement on what is already known. They do not equate to a master plan for Australian higher education. Instead, options and alternatives are put forward, based on heredity’s key findings, and are grounded in Australian higher education’s legislative past. One hopes that they may take on a life of their own, such that heredity becomes more prominent in higher education discourse and informs the transition to post-universal levels of participation.

Reinvigorating Australian Legislatures

Chapter Five went to elaborate lengths to make the point that each legislature is different. Various social, economic and political forces are mediated by legislatures to produce legislation relevant to their specific time, demography and geography. Whilst a Westminster tradition and geographic proximity contributed to a convergence on the model of the public university, variations were evident in each jurisdiction’s approach to the establishment and financing of higher education. Variations were more subtle at the points at which universities were established. Sydney and Melbourne were comparable in their legislative form, even if creating minor path dependencies in the pursuit of sound learning or useful knowledge. They were both, however, markedly different to the legislation establishing the Australian National University and New South Wales University of Technology nearly a century later. In these cases, advanced study was core to their founding mission.

The Commonwealth adopted an entirely unique legislative approach, breaking the path dependencies of the past. One can assume that the referral of constitutional powers for higher education to the Commonwealth settles any role for jurisdictional differences. There is one jurisdiction in play, and it shall be thus ever more. It is not impossible, however, for a state or territory to pass legislation relevant to higher education financing under current arrangements.

Trow’s call to action for European higher education in the publication of Problems in the transition from elite to mass higher education was to support a diversity of institutional type and mission. This diversity has proven to be difficult to sustain in Australia when the dominant single-payer legislative system adopts a one-size-fits-all funding model, privileging the public university. Gallagher suggests that “a monolithic system of single-type institutions will necessarily lack the diversity necessary for adaptation to changing environmental conditions”.45 It is hard in this context to see the Commonwealth legislating for diversity beyond the current monolithic system. There are votes to be lost by legislating for what might be perceived as more favourable treatment for a state or region (if diversity responds to local requirements), and policy monopolies protecting the status quo (if diversity favours new institutional forms).

A distinct jurisdiction could legitimately seek to catalyse competitive advantage for institutions operating within their borders. There are already differences between states in the proportion of university revenue derived from state and local governments (Table 10), although much of

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these differences can be attributed to dual-sector institutions in receipt of Commonwealth funding for higher education and state funding for vocational education.

Table 10. University Revenue Derived from State and Local Government, 2018

State University Revenue from State and Local Government46

$ % % Excluding VET

Northern Territory $71 m 24.4% 4.9%

Western Australia $89 m 3.1%

Tasmania $25 m 3.2%

Victoria $264 m 2.7% 1.2%

South Australia $39 m 1.9%

Queensland $95 m 1.7% 1.4%

New South Wales $113 m 1.1%

Australian Capital Territory $7 m 0.4%

A stronger role for the states has emerged in recent policy discourse.47 The Victorian government has recently committed $350 million for universities.48 An op-ed and emergency relief funding do not make for a new legislative sub-system but do provide legitimacy for a plausible utopia in which Australian legislatures play a more active role in supporting higher education in service of their constituencies.

There is no groundswell of support or state involvement in higher education. Interviews with senior higher education leaders have bemoaned the anachronistic roles that states now play in higher education as “all care, no responsibility”.49 A reinvigorated legislature would need to transcend this critique, reconcile the previous referral of powers, and consider the mechanisms that might best build on legacy legislative sub-systems. The sector’s heredity provides cues as to what form this might take. State funding for universities beyond the core endowment has included funding for infrastructure, scholarships and more general “additional contributions”. The Commonwealth’s first foray into funding higher education involved funding for research and scholarships. A turbocharged state scholarship scheme, building program, research scheme or restoration of fixed endowment would not be without precedent and might catalyse a multijurisdictional pivot to a post-universal legislative future. This heredity research suggests that additional funding is more likely to be an enduring feature of higher education if encoded in legislation, rather than a mere component of a minister’s departmental discretionary expenditure or one-off appropriation.

Legislated Institutional Diversity

The legislative basis for the heredity of higher education started with the University of Sydney in 1850. All subsequent universities have been established with a legislative backing, perpetual succession and distinct body corporates and politic. No Australian university established through legislation has yet failed to live up to this perpetual aspiration. There have been dalliances around university mergers between Curtin and Murdoch Universities50 and the

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Universities of Adelaide and South Australia,51 but as yet each newly established public university is part of the perpetual inheritance of Australian higher education that has endured across time. The same cannot be said of other forms of higher education, or more broad tertiary education. The Dawkins reforms saw non-university institutions merged to form new universities or were absorbed within existing universities and a legislative framework geared towards perpetual succession. The reverse was not true; no university gave up its perpetual legislative status to be overrun by a college or institute.

If Australia is to have a level of institutional diversity consistent with Trow’s summation and Gallagher’s identified risk of homogeneity, it is plausible that a jurisdiction could again legislate for difference. In doing so, the success of any new institutional form will have to confront the homogenising effects of a one-size-fits-all Commonwealth funding model. It is hard for a Bachelor of Arts at a sandstone university to be markedly different than that offered at a hypothetical “college of liberal arts” when a Commonwealth supported place available at either is exactly the same monetary value. An inheritance of institutional diversity may be better nurtured and sustained if variations in the offerings across different institutional settings are financed with a variable financing model. It is not implausible that a jurisdiction might legislate for new institutional forms to achieve this outcome. It was the stated policy of the Labor opposition heading into the 2016 election to establish “Commonwealth Institutes of Higher Education”.52 This is an idea that may be dusted off if Labor are returned to power. In the interim, any jurisdiction, be it state, territory or Commonwealth, is free to legislate aspects of this idea into existence.

Australia deliberately catalysed institutional diversity through the binary system. Australia also deliberately collapsed the binary through the unified national system. Throughout these policy sub-systems, some institutions have managed to survive with a modicum of public funding. Non-university higher education providers, such as Avondale University College and Alphacrusis College, have been part of the higher education system without being part of the unified national system. Institutional diversity includes colleges with a long history that do not have a legislative backing. This existing diversity could be deliberately embraced by a jurisdiction that values higher education diversity. Many of these colleges have an affiliation with faith and religion. They are perhaps closer to the “religion and morality” purposes of the University of Sydney in 1850 than the technocratic proposal for engagement with industry that enables graduates to thrive in the labour market. Legislatures could get past their secular resistance by providing access to public financing for more faith-based institutions. Whilst the Australian Catholic University and University of Notre Dame have overt connections to the Catholic Church, their public funding is conditional on apparent secularism.

There are over 100 non-public university higher education providers operating today. The rapid growth of public universities under demand-driven funding led to the recapping of the system and concerns about too many of the wrong people being admitted to higher education.53 A surprising finding of research into the non-public university higher education sector is that domestic enrolments grew faster outside of the public university sector than within the life of demand-driven funding.54 Much of this growth can be attributed to these providers operating in specialised niches not well served by the big public comprehensive institutions. A diversity of institutions already exists, but financing legislation has not fully embraced them, and indeed students choosing to attend this form of institution are penalised

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financially on two levels. First, there is no access to direct Commonwealth subsidy, and, second, any deferred tuition fees attract a loan fee.

Full integration of the non-university higher education provider sector in a post-universal participation legislative sub-system is made more difficult given the mix of motivations and aspirations: for-profit and not-for-profit, public and private, faith based and secular, international and domestic focus, multiple and singular fields of education, and sub-bachelor and postgraduate orientation. One cannot turn all of these variants into state-regulated public utilities. Extending public subsidies to non-typical institutions might be desirable on institutional diversity grounds, but it comes with risks given the presence of less-than-scrupulous policy actors. The egregious rorting and exploitation of disadvantaged students through VET FEE-HELP looms large over any legislature deliberately seeking to extend public subsidy beyond the tried and trusted formula of large comprehensive public universities.55 There is, however, greater potential in nurturing many small institutions to serve specific social, economic, cultural and knowledge-related needs, whilst complementing the role of public universities, rather than expecting public universities to serve such a multiplicity of purposes.

Anticipating Adaptive Pressures

The heredity of Australian higher education suggests that specific needs will emerge that cannot be accommodated by the financing arrangements encoded in higher education legislation at any specific point in time. Today’s adequate resourcing is tomorrow’s deficit or unmet need. The challenge of adequacy of state resourcing was central to Burton Clark’s exploration of the entrepreneurial university. Clark documented the pathways taken by some universities for self-reliance: other government income, private organised sources, and university generated income.56

Clark’s entrepreneurial university may appear to be far from the legislated heredity of Australian higher education, but it does highlight that universities are quasi-sovereign entities in their own right. Established as a body corporate and politic, universities choose who can and cannot be admitted for membership as students and staff. Members participate in democratic processes of self-government. The university can make legislation and policy. There is much that the university can do to anticipate adaptive pressure and legislate accordingly. Harvard University does not derive over US$2 billion in revenue on interest on its investments (see page 154) as a result of law passed by the Massachusetts or United States legislatures. The university has chosen to invest and has resisted the temptation to buy everything now. Harvard’s self-gratification has consistently been delayed to a point where interest on its endowment is now larger than the total revenue for any Australian university. Income derived from Harvard’s endowment constitutes near two-fifths of its revenue. By contrast, the average investment income as a proportion of total revenue for Australian universities is 2.2%.57 The maximum investment return is observed at Federation University, with 6.5%. It would take quite the self-discipline to establish, grow and protect an endowment that might one day deliver robust investment returns and self-reliance. Some institutions have set out to create this legacy endowment, confronting pressure to scale back future provisions to satisfy immediate needs.58

The Australian higher education system has pursued the entrepreneurial path en masse in the form of private investment, principally from international students. This revenue stream has

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proven unreliable when confronted by a pandemic, and the restoration of these revenue streams might be slower than anticipated given increasing tensions between Australia and the primary international source country, China.59 The ability to redirect a proportion of private investment in higher education into a longer-term endowment will be harder for entrepreneurial institutions in this context.

Moving away from institutional choice, jurisdictions have sought to create mechanisms to establish endowments for higher education, and other purposes. Western Australia established a university endowment in 1904, several years before it established a university. The Commonwealth legislated for the creation of a Science and Industry Endowment in 192660 and a Medical Research Endowment in 1937.61 The Medical Research Future Fund62 has now reached $20 billion, and interest is now funding various research projects. The Commonwealth’s Future Fund holds over $200 billion in funds.63 It is plausible that a jurisdiction (institution, state, territory or Commonwealth) could establish an endowment mechanism, supported by public funds or private investment. Such an endowment might one day support a level of self-reliance, or better accommodate adaptive pressures and trend towards complexity in higher education.

Consolidation

The universities Acts first established in 1850 remain in place as a core feature of Australian higher education today. Their role as financing legislation has been displaced by Commonwealth’s legislation. Across the states and Commonwealth, a process of proliferation of funded activities and intermittent consolidation is evident, operating on long time horizons. Universities Acts as financing Acts last around a century and a quarter. The States Grants Acts sub-system operated across a much-condensed but still lengthy four decades: 1951 to 1988. HESA is a comparative adolescent in this context, a mere 17 years of age. It is unclear how long HESA will last as a legislative sub-system, nor how it will embed a proliferation of activities. It is not implausible to see that the types of HELP on offer might continue to replicate; Micro-credential-HELP, PhD HELP, Start-Up HELP, Work Integrated Learning HELP, Industry Engagement HELP. The variants are limited by one’s imagination and the ways within which the Commonwealth might seek to shift the cost of expansion towards and beyond universal participation with new variants of a proven model.

It is also plausible that we may see some consolidation in the current features of HESA, rolling OS HELP, SA-FEE-HELP, HECS-HELP and FEE-HELP into just HELP, whilst excising the now-redundant VET FEE-HELP from the body of HESA. A consolidated loan program, adopting a definition of student fees appropriate for universal participation, might confront significant resistance from policy monopolies, but appears a more sensible approach than persisting with fee conventions codified in 1951 (see page 122). The utility of the heredity conceptual model is the ease with which one switches between macro features of the legislative sub-system (HELP), and micro details of genes and text (fee definitions) spanning legislative systems and points in evolutionary time. This allows for the juxtaposition of challenges of financing a post-universal participation system with the specific phrasing and origins of key legislative clauses. HESA persists with defining fees in ways that are solely connected to a course of study (rather than units or micro-credentials), excluding residential accommodation (preventing the bundling of educational experiences) and student organisation (subverting the democratic features of the university as body corporate and politic).64 These distinctions were first made in 1951, establishing a path dependency that is no longer fit for purpose. Opting in and out of

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education, and getting the skills and training one needs at a particular point in the life course, are incompatible with HESA’s key design features.

Similarly, limiting the private resources that individuals or families might want to direct to personal development is a level of regulatory overreach that contributes to frequent amendment of financing legislation. Each point at which more places need to be financed by shifting the balance of public and private contributions creates a storm of controversy that could be avoided by simply permitting those with means to invest in their own education. Concerns about equity and fairness can be resolved with specific accountability measures (e.g. additional funding conditional on scholarships or “evening lectures”), or direct investment in scholarships. This simple act of consolidating the definition of a fee from highly prescriptive detail might have the negative effect of fewer jobs for policy analysts and administrators, but would decrease the rate of amendments to higher education financing legislation and allow parliaments more time to focus on more pressing policy problems.

Governance and Accountability

It is unlikely that any jurisdiction will be happy to direct billions in funding to higher education without mechanisms that assure taxpayers that their money has been spent appropriately and for a proper purpose. The red tape of governance and accountability will not go away, unless the sector can find a credible path to self-reliance. No high-participation higher education system in the world has achieved this impossible utopia. The challenge in a post-universal participation system is one of ensuring there is the right level of governance and accountability. That universities spend $280 million on this purpose in 2011 appears excessive, and it is unlikely that this amount has declined in absolute or relative terms in the following decade. Existing policy and practice suggest there is a way forward from the over-regulated public utility that higher education functions as to a post-universal participation future.

Different levels of regulation are applied to those seeking to be higher education providers, those who are operating as higher education providers and those operating as mature universities. TEQSA’s regulatory approach and scrutiny varies by a provider’s history and standing. The underlying principle of regulation that is proportionate to risk can be extended to financing legislation. Rather than one size fits all of the Commonwealth Grants Scheme, those institutions seen to be lower risk due to their quality, performance and level of existing quality assurance (e.g. reporting to state parliaments) could simply be left to manage their affairs. Governance fit for perpetuity is already hardwired into the Acts of universities, and there is unnecessary duplication in validating university accountability with $280 million of compliance requirements. State government regulation of universities will be more focused if they contribute more than single-digit percentage values to university and higher education financing.

This still leaves open questions about the governance and accountability of colleges, but there is again an existing mechanism that can be deployed more broadly across the sector. Those providers with a track record of sound governance and performance can earn self-accrediting authority, for some or all of their operations, and can play a more prominent part in a post-universal participation system if financing legislation allows.

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Summary of Components of a Post-universal Participation Legislation Sub-system

The components of a post-universal participation legislative sub-system outlined in previous sections can be considered as broad policy directions rather than carefully mapped master plan. Consistent with the summation and presentation of ideas and findings throughout this dissertation, these components can be overlayed with the stylised model of Heredity and integrated higher education public policy cycle (Figure 16). This can be understood not as a single is Commonwealth policy cycle, but multiple policy cycles operating across reinvigorated Australian legislatures. The Commonwealth and states mediating their distinct contexts to produce legislation to support universal levels of participation.

Figure 16. Components of a Post-universal Participation Legislation Sub-system

The Commonwealth is best positioned to coordinate the system in line with national interests and has the financing muscle to sustain a more effective higher education loan program. This financing capability makes the Commonwealth more likely to build and sustain a large-scale higher education future fund. Establishing an endowment fund is easy; maintaining and growing this fund for Harvard scale and impact is more difficult. The Higher Education Endowment Fund Act was passed in 2007, only to be repealed in 2008.65 The Commonwealth has constitutional responsibilities for immigration, and plays a critical role in the policy settings that have supported a vibrant international education sector.

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The states, however, are better able to pass legislation that responds to more local social, economic and cultural demands. The states have played this role in the past. The states could pass legislation creating targeted scholarships and grants, in much the same way as they did in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. The States can also play a role in establishing new institutions, be they universities, colleges, or institutes. Each variant would still need to satisfy the Commonwealth regulatory requirements and standards, but could be established with specific and targeted missions, as Body Politic and Corporate in perpetuity.

Macro financing policy settings arising from the mix of Commonwealth and State financing legislation, would provide a more stable platform for higher education financing that embeds systemic protections for those in genuine need, without unduly limiting private investment in higher education. Scholarships might be targeted at distinct local need, or national interest, with income contingent loans providing a safety net for all, whilst blunting incentives for almost all students to defer the cost of their studies irrespective of their financial circumstances.

The resulting mix of public and private, and Commonwealth and state funding, can be directed to a more balanced system of universities and colleges, recognising the distinctive research capabilities of universities. Students would have more flexibility to move in and out of universities and colleges to support lifelong learning. Universities would have well-defined self-regulation powers, still accountable, but not overwhelmed in red tape. Colleges may earn higher levels of autonomy where their quality of governance and performance warrants. Neither of these components is inconsistent with the heredity of Australian higher education. Each facet of this model has a legislative precedent at some point in the sector’s 170-year heredity.

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1 Clark Kerr, The administration of higher education in an era of change and conflict. First David D. Henry Lecture (University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Illinois, 1972).

2 Russell Linke, Department of Employment, Education and Training, and Performance Indicators Research Group, Performance indicators in higher education: Report of a trial evaluation study, commissioned by the Commonwealth Department of Employment, Education and Training (Department of Employment, Education and Training 1991).

3 Kwong Lee Dow and Valerie Braithwaite, Review of higher education regulation report. (Commonwealth of Australia, 2013), 48.

4 Michelle Grattan, “Australian universities tied up in $280 million red tape,” The Conversation, 8 April 2013.

5 Tony Abbott, “Tony Abbott’s Address to Universities Australia Higher Education Conference 28/02/13,” retrieved 29 August 2017, https://web.archive.org/web/20130420183929/http://www.liberal.org.au/latest-news/2013/02/28/tony-abbotts-address-universities-australia-higher-education-conference.

6 Commonwealth of Australia, Mid-year economic and fiscal outlook 2017–18, December 2017, (Commonwealth of Australia, 2017), retrieved 1 October 2020, https://archive.budget.gov.au/2017-18/myefo/MYEFO_2017-18.pdf.

7 Department of Education, Stakeholder consultation on proposed free speech amendments to the Higher Education Support Act 2003 (HESA) (Department of Education, 2020), document created 9 January 2020, https://docs.education.gov.au/node/53209.

8 Tertiary Education Quality and Standards Agency Amendment (Prohibiting Academic Cheating Services) Act 2020 (Cth).

9 Department of Education, Final report for performance-based funding for the Commonwealth Grant Scheme (Department of Education, 2019), document created 7 August 2019, https://docs.education.gov.au/node/52995.

10 Australian Research Council, National interest test statements, (Australian Research Council, 2020), retrieved 1 October 2020, https://www.arc.gov.au/national-interest-test-statements.

11 Jon Piccini and Dirk Moses, “Simon Birmingham’s intervention in research funding is not unprecedented, but dangerous,” The Conversation, 26 October 2018.

12 Mikayla Novak, The red tape state (Institute of Public Affairs, Melbourne, 2016).

13 Grattan, “Australian universities tied up in $280 million red tape”.

14 Hazel Ferguson and Henry Sherrell, Overseas students in Australian higher education: A quick guide (Commonwealth of Australia, Parliamentary Library Research Papers Series, 20, 2019), document created 20 June 2019, https://www.aph.gov.au/About_Parliament/Parliamentary_Departments/Parliamentary_Library/pubs/rp/rp1819/Quick_Guides/OverseasStudents.

15 Frank Larkins, and Ian Marshman, Australian universities overseas student recruitment: Financing strategies and outcomes from 2004 to 2014 (LH Martin Institute, University of Melbourne, 2016),

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retrieved 1 October 2020, https://franklarkins.files.wordpress.com/2018/11/a23-aus-higher-education-policy-analysis-overseas-students-recruitment-flarkins-imarshman-mar2016.pdf.

16 Department of Education, 2008 - Financial Reports of Higher Education Providers (Department of Education, 2008), document created 11 March 2014, https://docs.education.gov.au/node/35437.: Department of Education and Training, 2018 Higher Education Providers Finance Table (Department of Education and Training, 2018), document created 13 March 2020, https://docs.education.gov.au/node/53363.

17 Universities Australia, Keep it clever: Policy statement (Universities Australia, Canberra, 2016).

18 Organisation for Economic and Cultural Development, Education at a glance 2020 (Organisation for Economic and Cultural Development Publishing, Paris, 2020).

19 Australian Government, Final Budget Outcome 2018-19 (Australian Government, 2019), retrieved 1 October 2020, https://archive.budget.gov.au/2018-19/index.htm

20 AusLII (2020) counts 2,663 items of legislation passed from 2003 to 2019, with 69 amendments over this timeframe, representing 2.6% of all Commonwealth legislation.

21 William. B. Lacy, et al., Australian universities at a crossroads: Insights from their leaders and implications for the future. (Centre for the Study of Higher Education. University of Melbourne & Centre for Studies in Higher Education. University of California Berkeley, 2017), 4.

22 Australian Government, Final Budget Outcome (Australian Government, 1999 to 2020), retrieved 1 October 2020, https://archive.budget.gov.au.

23 Martin Trow, Problems in the transition from elite to mass higher education (Carnegie Commission on Higher Education 1973), 35.

24 Clark Kerr, The uses of the university (Harvard University Press, 2005), 196.

25 For example, Department of Education, Transition to new accounting standards: Effect on research income for the 2021 Higher Education Research Data Collection (HERDC) requirements, Advance advice/guidance paper – July 2019 (Department of Education, 2019), document created 10 July 2019, https://docs.education.gov.au/documents/transition-new-accounting-standards-effect-research-income-2021-higher-education-research

26 Geoff Sharrock, “Beautiful lies, damned statistics: Reframing how Australian university finances are compared with the OECD,” Higher Education Policy, 31, no. 3 (2018): 333–357.

27 Geoff Sharrock, “Let’s glance: new OECD metrics on Australian tertiary spending. 2020,” retrieved 1 October 2020, https://geoffsharrockinmelbourne.net/2020/09/24/lets-glance-new-oecd-metrics-on-australian-tertiary-spending/.

28 Greg Megalogenis, “Balancing act: Australia between recession and renewal,” Quarterly Essay, 61. (2016): 1-67.

29 Matthew Lesh, Free speech on campus audit 2018 (Institute for Public Affairs, 2018).

30 Bella d’Abrera, The rise of identity politics: An audit of history teaching at Australian universities in 2017 (Institute for Public Affairs, 2017).

31 Higher Education Support Amendment (Job-Ready Graduates and Supporting Regional and Remote Students) Act (Cth), Schedule 2. s.5.

32 Novak, The red tape state.

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33 Conor Friedersdorf, “Politics and the collective noun: ‘A bordello of lobbyists,’ etc.” The Atlantic, 16 November 2012.

34 Universities Australia, Keep it clever: Policy statement.

35 University of Melbourne, “New hub for biomedical engineering research named after inventor of cochlear implant,” retrieved 1 October 2020, https://about.unimelb.edu.au/newsroom/news/2017/june/new-hub-for-biomedical-engineering-research-named-after-inventor-of-cochlear-implant.

36 University of Melbourne, “The ethical future of bionic vision,” retrieved 1 October 2020, https://pursuit.unimelb.edu.au/articles/the-ethical-future-of-bionic-vision.

37 CSIRO, “Revolutionary wifi invention selected for world in 100 Objects exhibition,” retrieved 1 October, https://www.csiro.au/en/News/News-releases/2016/Revolutionary-Wifi-invention-selected-for-World-in-100-Objects-ExhibitionNews-Release (2016).

38 The legislation was referred to the Senate Education and Employment Legislation Committee with dissenting reports from Labor, Greens and cross-bench Senators: Senate Education and Employment Legislation Committee, Higher Education Support Amendment (Job-Ready Graduates and Supporting Regional and Remote Students) Bill 2020 (Commonwealth of Australia, Senate, Education and Employment Legislation Committee, 2020).

39 Australian Government, Base Funding Review Background Paper (Australian Government, 2010), 19, 24, 25, 55.

40 Senate Education and Employment Legislation Committee, Higher Education Support Amendment (Job-Ready Graduates and Supporting Regional and Remote Students) Bill 2020 Public Hearings, 17 September 2020, 36, (The Hon Senator Kim Carr):

“You emphasise that issue of discretion. You have witnessed the steady growth in the level of Commonwealth interventions in the affairs of universities. Can you think of a bill in the education package at the Commonwealth level that has higher levels of ministerial discretion than this one?”

41 Department of Education, Skills and Employment, Job-ready Graduates Discussion Paper (Department of Education, Skills and Employment, 2020), document created, 19 June 2020, https://www.dese.gov.au/document/job-ready-graduates-discussion-paper.

42 Judith Sloan, “Please, sir, may we get some more?” The Australian, 4 March 2013.; Nick Cater, “Utopian university entrance plans fail poorer students.” The Australian, 29 February 2016.

43 John. S. Dawkins, Higher education: a policy statement (Department of Employment, Education and Training, Australian Government Publishing Service, 1988), 64.

44 The ecological university is one of several plausible utopias outlined by Barnett: Ronald Barnett, “The coming of the ecological university,” Oxford Review of Education, 37, no. 4 (2011): 439–455.

45 Mike Gallagher, A Memory of Elephants on the Modern Campus: Indicative Assumptions Underlying Higher Education Policy in Australia 1945-1985-2015: Academic, Statist and Market Perspectives (LH Martin Institute. University of Melbourne, 2016), 57.

46 Department of Education, 2008 - Financial Reports of Higher Education Providers.

47 John Hewson, “We don’t need a federal education minister: Re-imagining our federation,” Sydney Morning Herald, 7 May 2020.

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48 Premier of Victoria, The Hon Dan Andrews, Media release, Supporting Victorian Universities, (Premier of Victoria, The Hon Dan Andrews ), document created, 19 May 2020, https://www.premier.vic.gov.au/supporting-victorian-universities/

49 Matt Brett, Equity Performance and Accountability (National Centre for Student Equity in Higher Education, Curtin University, 2018), 33.

50 Funding for Murdoch University to undertake a merger feasibility study is described at: Department of Education Science and Training, “Delegate approval of determination no 544. Approval of Grants for Other Grants in 2005 payable under section 41–35 of the Higher Education Support Act 2003 (the Act) (Collaboration and Structural Reform Programme)” HEIMS Online Institution Payment Information. (Department of Education and Training, 2019), retrieved 29 September 2020, https://app.heims.education.gov.au/HeimsOnline/IPInfo/Determination.

51 University of Adelaide, “Adelaide and UniSA Chancellors call for submissions as merger discussion paper released,” retrieved 1 October 2020, https://www.adelaide.edu.au/news/news101782.html.

52 Stephen Parker, “Is Labor’s plan to create ten Institutes of higher education a good idea?” The Conversation, 16 June 2016.

53 Higher Education Standards Panel, Final report – Improving retention, completion and success in higher education (Higher Education Standards Panel, Department of Education and Training, 2018), document created 7 June 2018, https://docs.education.gov.au/node/50816.

54 Matt Brett, et al, Equity at and beyond the boundary of Australian universities (National Centre for Student Equity in Higher Education. La Trobe University, Melbourne 2018).

55 Mark Warburton, The VET FEE-HELP debacle: Helping its victims and lessons for administration (LH Martin Institute, University of Melbourne, 2016).

56 Burton R. Clark, On higher education: Selected writings, 1956–2006 (Johns Hopkins University Press, 2008), 501.

57 Department of Education, 2008 - Financial Reports of Higher Education Providers.

58 Robert Bolton, “Universities start to make staff redundant,” Australian Financial Review, 22 April 2020.

59 James Laurenceson, “Why the Australia-China relationship is unravelling faster than we could have imagined,” The Conversation, 9 September 2020.

60 Science and Industry Endowment Act 1926 (Cth).

61 Medical Research Endowment Act 1937 (Cth).

62 Medical Research Future Fund, “Medical Research Future Fund,” retrieved 1 October 2020, https://www.health.gov.au/initiatives-and-programs/medical-research-future-fund.

63 Future Fund, “Future Fund,” retrieved 1 October 2020, https://www.futurefund.gov.au.

64 Higher Education Support Act (2003 (Cth), compilation C2020C00197, s. 19–102.

65 Higher Education Endowment Fund Act 2007 (No 160, 2007) (Cth).

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CHAPTER NINE: HEREDITY AS AN ANALYTIC TOOL

A university is a mechanism for the inheritance of the Western style of civilisation. It preserves, transmits, and enriches learning, and it undergoes evolution as animals and plants do. Like animals and plants, universities are products of heredity and environment. The American-university derives its heredity from Europe (in origin it is an Anglo-German hybrid); but the American environment has transformed it into a new species of institution, which is now being successfully transplanted to other parts of the world. Now I come to my point. It is possible to make some useful predictions about the heredity of universities in the year 2000. It is not possible to make useful predictions about the social environment in which universities likely to operate.

Eric Ashby (1968). The case for ivory towers.1

After all, we are reasonably certain that, whatever our future environment may be, its chief architect will be the university. If, therefore we are careful about the quality and the character of the university, if we respect its organic nature, and are careful about its strength, we will retain the capacity constantly to affect and finally to determine the nature of our developing environment. By knowing the heredity of the university we may assure to the future university a healthy, stimulating environment. If this is not the way in which Sir Eric intended to present the problem, it is at least for me an interesting train of thought which he sparked and for it I am grateful.

Owen Meredith Wilson (1968). An interpretation of the papers and the discussions.2

This dissertation ends as it began, with Eric Ashby making “The case for ivory towers”, this time juxtaposed not with Trow’s response delayed by 20 years, but with the immediate reaction from Owen Wilson, at the time President of the University of Minnesota. In the space between Chapter One’s Introduction to Heredity and Chapter Eight’s Heredity and the Future of Australian Higher Education, it is clear that Ashby’s framing has sparked an interesting train of thought. From 1850 to 2020, the University of Sydney, and all universities that followed, have exerted considerable influence on Australian society. They are the architects of the world in which we live. They play a hand in educating the doctors, nurses and midwives to support the birthing process and health needs across the life span. Universities equip teachers with the professional skills to support the development of our youth, and learners of all ages. Australia’s prosperity is underpinned by the role universities play in knowledge creation and application.

Ashby’s framing of heredity, however thought provoking, was disconnected from a causal mechanism through which inherited characteristics could, analogous to the natural world, be transmitted across time and evolve. Through integrating ideas and models from higher education and public policy literature, this dissertation moves from provocative reflective narrative to a more coherent description of heredity in the Australian higher education system. This model of heredity emerges from the work of three eminent figures in the history of higher education, spanning English, American and Australian higher education.

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Ashby refers to the university as a “mechanism for the inheritance of the Western style of civilisation”3. Kerr refers to the university as a “mechanism held together by administrative rules and powered by money”4. Davis provokes the extension of the mechanism to Australian universities, with the rules first described with the University of Sydney ensuring “the path chosen early still guides the bearing”5. Spanning disciplinary traditions of botany, economics and public policy, Ashby, Kerr and Davis contribute to a model of heredity in which the biological metaphor of heredity is brought to life as an integrated public policy and higher education cycle, bridged by financing legislation’s monetary administrative rules. These rules are the “DNA” that can be examined for the context in which they are situated; broad chromosomal features, and precise changes at the base pair level. The lineage of these rules can be traced across time, legislation and jurisdictions. The means by which policy is institutionalised as a path dependency can be assessed in forensic detail.

Application of this model of heredity to Australian higher education delivers explanatory insight to patterns of higher education policymaking that are not well explained in the literature. There are few references to the high frequency of policy reform in the Australian higher education context, both in contemporary policy and across the history of the sector. The heredity model helps quantify the rate of policy change, and how it compares internationally. The heredity model progresses an understanding of the casual factors shaping Australian higher education policy and policymaking, and their relative influence across time.

An understanding of heredity provides cues as to the processes that enable the transmission of heritable characteristics across time. The repository of legislation and its embedded detail also allows one to isolate the specific text that has been retained and/or transmitted across time. There will always remain the strong caveat that the future is unknown, but it is not unreasonable to suggest that text strongly conserved within legislation will be transmitted into the future. Change appears to be the result of deliberate efforts to rewrite the legislative genetic code. Purposeful change does however, confront a social and political reality that tends to favour the status quo.

The initial framing of heredity by Ashby encouraged higher education leaders to think critically about the features of the university that should be nurtured and protected, recognising that various social forces might unduly undermine the qualities of the ivory tower. Academic solitude, academic freedom, in loco parentis, academic governance and pursuit of truth over results-oriented requirements of politicians and industry are all cited by Ashby in his framing of heredity. A half century later, and in a uniquely Australian context, the model of heredity allows one to reflect deeply on the qualities in contemporary higher education that should feature prominently as the future’s inheritance. This dissertation provides tools and evidence that may ground such an exercise in the importance of identifying the attributes one may wish to retain through integration within legislation. The dissertation also serves to highlight the challenges implicit in the policy process for achieving any preferred policy outcome.

Heredity has proven useful for making sense of Australian higher education financing legislation, but its use as an analytical tool has a broader reach. Both Ashby and Kerr were concerned with “the university” rather than the larger higher education system. This dissertation has been fixated on legislation produced by parliaments to fund higher education, initially at the level of the university, but with a broader system-wide scope as the sector has grown. An alternative heredity framing could delve into the university, recognising its quasi-

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legislature standing as a “body corporate and politic” that is adept at producing and refining administrative rules. One might apply heredity to an appreciation of policy change within a university, rather than beyond. Core findings relating to heredity around the importance of jurisdictions, the trend to complexity, and patterns of proliferation and consolidation may be evident in analysis of policy within an institution, and across institutions.

The dissertation’s exploration of heredity remains firmly rooted in the Australian context. Care has been taken to avoid consigning this work to Burton Clark’s ‘intellectual backwater’ critique of single system studies. A key consideration for any future application of heredity as an analytic tool could consider whether the patterns evident in the Australian context are replicated in other national systems, seeking to understand similarities and differences through robust international comparative analysis.

Whilst rooted in Australia, the dissertation is also rooted in higher education, and there is scope to consider integrated policy cycles across other domains, be that education policy or other areas in which the state plays an active role. The lineage and inheritance of ideas in various forms of social and economic policy are open to similar forms of analysis. Perhaps, as Wilson suggests, this exploration of heredity of higher education can be the architect of the future in which analysis of heredity is more routine than the novel research undertaken within this doctoral study.

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1 Eric Ashby, “The case for ivory towers,” Higher education in tomorrow’s world: A symposium of the International Conference of Higher Education Commemorating the Sesquicentennial of the University of Michigan, April 26–29, 1967, ed, Algo. D. Henderson, (University of Michigan, 1968), 6.

2 Owen M. Wilson, “An interpretation of the papers and the discussions,” Higher education in tomorrow’s world: A symposium of the International Conference of Higher Education Commemorating the Sesquicentennial of the University of Michigan, April 26–29, 1967, ed, Algo. D. Henderson, (University of Michigan, 1968), 162.

3 Ashby, “The case for ivory towers,” 6.

4 Clark Kerr, The uses of the university (Harvard University Press, 2005), 15.

5 Glyn Davis, The Australian idea of a university (Melbourne University Publishing 2017), 28.

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Brett, Matthew Charles

Title:

The heredity of Australian higher education

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2020

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http://hdl.handle.net/11343/267348

File Description:

Final thesis file

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